


Pretty Venom In My Veins

by sunsetmagnolia



Category: 5 Seconds of Summer (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Choose Your Own Adventure, Eventual Happy Ending, Fluff and Humor, M/M, Multi, alcohol mention only in chapter 54, blood mentions, but if you don't like how it ends you can pick a different ending, nothing graphic though only in a vague vampire way, some unhappy endings but hopefully in a funny way
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-11
Updated: 2020-11-11
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:14:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 55
Words: 37,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunsetmagnolia/pseuds/sunsetmagnolia
Summary: Choose your own vampire adventure!You pick the pov character, you pick what happens, and if you end up somewhere you don't like, just go back and try again.
Relationships: Calum Hood/Ashton Irwin, Luke Hemmings/Ashton Irwin, Luke Hemmings/Calum Hood, Michael Clifford/Ashton Irwin, Michael Clifford/Calum Hood
Kudos: 23





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Shout out to [Sam](https://tirednotflirting.tumblr.com/) for being my sounding board for this crazy idea, your enthusiasm is priceless.
> 
> This fic is a gift to The Club, bc you're all a gift to me.

**This fic is formatted like a Choose Your Own Adventure book, so don’t read through this like a regular fic. At the end of each chapter, you’ll be given two options. Click on the option you want to be taken to that chapter in the story. There are 5 penultimate endings depending on the choices you make, and lots of dead ends along the way. Don’t let a dead end disappoint you, they’re all meant to be fun! If you're a chaotic person and decide to read it in order, it will make no sense and have minimal continuity, but I'm not the boss of you I guess.**

Michael and Luke walk out of the juice bar. Two pairs of eyes are on them, but they’re not really aware of either. The building looks like any other on the block, like a quirky basement storefront under some apartments that already have their lights out because, unlike these two, their residents know to go to bed at a normal time. Well, a normal time for humans.

Michael makes a joke about some guy who left town, and Luke rolls his eyes, smiling fondly despite not finding the joke all that funny. They turn down the street, presumably to head home.

Of the two people watching them, the one crouched behind the car across the street is a human, and the one pretending to talk on the phone under the lamppost down the street is a hunter. Neither of them are inexperienced in watching this particular pair. Whose POV do you choose?

**For the hunter, go to[chapter 2](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67251307). For the human, go to [chapter 3](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67251397).**


	2. Chapter 2

Ashton has been following the trail of these vampires for a while now, and he knows he’s bound to catch them doing _something_ wrong, but so far, besides staying up at all hours and making terrible jokes, they don’t seem to be any different than other humans. He catches himself second-guessing whether these are even the right ones, whether they’re vampires at all, but he _knows_ they are. He has reason to believe they’re somehow feeding in that juice bar they go to every other day. He went in once and it looked normal, they served normal human drinks, but he has a gut feeling that’s just a front.

He makes sure to stay far enough back that the two vampires don’t think he’s following them, but close enough that he doesn’t lose track of them between the juice bar and their destination. One of them has a bigger tendency to stay home, but he also bends to the other’s whim fairly easily, which is how Ashton finds himself following them to a park where they sit on the swings. They’re chatting inaudibly from his vantage point in the bushes, and it’s dark enough that he could attack, but a little voice in his head reminds him he’s not 100% positive they’re actually vampires, that being off by even 1% could lead to murder, and no amount of vampire hunter lawyers could help him out of that one.

One of them stands up, says something in a rather defiant tone, and then starts to walk away. The other yells after him, “Fine then, Michael, be a bitch.” The first one – Michael, apparently – throws a middle finger up over his shoulder as he walks away.

**To follow Michael: go to[chapter 4](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67251460). To stay and watch, go to [chapter 5](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67251502).**


	3. Chapter 3

Calum steps out from the shadow of the car and watches them as they walk down the street toward their apartment. He knows they’re vampires, and he knows the juice bar they’ve just walked out of has a blood bar in the back. He made it inside past the front barista one time and almost got killed for being in a place where humans weren’t welcome. Of course he knew what he was doing, walking into a room full of thirsty vampires. Calum has wanted to be a vampire for as long as he can remember, but the vampire barista had kicked him out on threat of being drained instead of turned, and he had to admit that wasn’t quite the level of risk he was expecting. He’d thought he could flirt with someone and get them to turn him, make it fast and then he’d be free to be a vampire himself for the rest of his [immortal] life. He hadn’t considered that a thirsty vampire in a room designed for them to let their guard down might just drink him dry instead.

He had, however, noted these two vampires there, who seemed fairy young as far as vampires went. He’d waited outside the bar to see when they left, and watched through the window as one of them took a wheatgrass shot from the front bar before they walked out. Calum had decided they were probably fun and safe to approach to try and become a vampire.

Which brings him to tonight, where he’s walking in their direction on the other side of the street. They stop at a park, and Calum assumes they’re going to fly the rest of the way home, so he jogs across the street to join them before they do. Michael rolls his eyes when he notices Calum, and then Luke sees him too.

**To talk to Michael, go to[chapter 6](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67251538). To talk to Luke, go to [chapter 7](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67251595). **


	4. Chapter 4

Ashton crawls his way backward out of the bush and pulls his hood up as he walks, pretending to be absorbed in his phone and hoping the vampire left on the swing set doesn’t recognize him.

Michael, Ashton realizes quickly, is the one of the two who spends a lot of his time at home. He follows at a distance until Michael is at his apartment, luckily not too far a walk, and then finds himself not knowing what to do. He couldn’t very well follow him in unless he wanted Michael to get a clear view of his face, and it’s not even the type of apartment complex with a buzzer box so he can pretend to have lost his key to some poor neighbor. That’s the end of his night, then. Ashton gives up and goes back to the park, but by then the other vampire is gone, which leaves him with nothing to do but return home himself.

The next morning, he knows exactly where the vampire will be: working at a coffee shop that irritatingly doesn’t make employees wear name tags. If he’s being honest, this is one of those things that makes him question whether he’s right about them being vampires, or at least about this one. What kind of a self-respecting vampire works at a coffee shop? Ashton walks in, mind clouded with intentions to find proof, and still that tiny voice telling him he’s probably wrong, that a vampire who can go over a week without killing – or at least biting – isn’t really a vampire, and he has no real reason to believe the juice bar is a front. He stands in line to order coffee, not realizing he’s zoned out staring at the cute, potentially vampiric barista until the customer behind him coughs obnoxiously and he takes a step forward.

“What can I get you today?” Michael asks cheerfully. Ashton looks up at the sign, as if he ever changes his order. “If you’re having trouble deciding, we have a new vanilla cold brew you might like to try?”

“Yeah, I’ll try that,” Ashton finds himself saying. _Since when does he drink anything but black coffee?_ Since today, looks like. He slides his card and gives Michael his name, and then wonders if maybe he should have given a fake name instead. It’s not like he’s well-known, but his family has been in the vampire hunting business for a long time, and if this guy is a vampire, albeit a cute one, he wouldn’t have to dig very deep to know Ashton’s name. Michael doesn’t comment on his name, just writes it on a cup and hands Ashton his receipt along with another bright smile.

Ashton slides the receipt into his pocket and steps aside to let the next customer order. He only has time to sit down and pull out his laptop to pretend to work while he eavesdrops before his name is being called to say his drink is ready. He gets through a morning of learning absolutely nothing he didn’t know before. He goes over his notes on Michael and the other vampire, looks over the map of their apartment and their workplaces and the bar they frequent, and comes to no conclusions. Aside from the coffee being a bit sweeter than he usually likes, and obviously not hot, it’s not that bad. He wonders if it has anything to do with the cute barista who suggested it to him, but that would be crazy.

Michael’s shift ends at 2, and Ashton packs up right when he knows Michael is about to leave. He walks out the front of the building and then sneaks his way around the side through the alley to the employee parking lot where he sees Michael on his phone. He jumps back around the corner to where they can’t see each other and listens carefully.

“What do you mean, you _found_ Calum?” Michael asks. He pauses to listen to the response, and then groans. “God, Luke, you can’t just let him—yeah I get you didn’t invite him over but you just let him—” Another groan. “Luke, are you stupid? You can’t do that. You know you can’t do that, right?” Ashton distantly wonders what he’s talking about, as he decides Luke must be the name of the other vampire. “Okay fine, but take care of it. He doesn’t know what he wants.” Michael sighs, and Ashton gets the feeling the conversation is wrapping up. He tiptoes even further down the wall and hears Michael hang up. Ashton could pretend to be getting in his car too, for an excuse to talk to Michael, but he thinks better of it. Anyway, Michael is quieter than is helpful to him, despite being all smiles with customers. Following him from there would just mean seeing him drive home and disappear back into his apartment, where Ashton still hasn’t figured out how to get in without moving in.

Ashton follows him anyway, and he knows he’s made the right choice when the other vampire greets him at the front door, side by side with a third person – another vampire? – who looks slightly ashamed but resolute as Michael tells Luke off for… something. Ashton’s windows are rolled down from his street parking, but Luke isn’t loud enough for Ashton to hear both sides of the conversation. It’s as bad as hearing him talk on the phone, though he is actually starting to enjoy the sound of Michael’s voice.

“We’ve established that Calum’s an idiot, what’s your excuse?” Michael asks, and Ashton snorts a laugh. This poor Calum guy’s getting torn apart, and for what? “That’s not a good excuse!” Michael yells, and Ashton thinks he can see Luke blush. Luke makes a hand gesture like he’s trying to get Michael to be quiet, which just causes him to make a strangled noise before walking into the building.

Luke walks Calum to the road, and from there Ashton can finally hear what they’re saying. “Sorry about him,” Luke says. “But he’s right. You can’t keep doing this.”

“Shouldn’t I be able to make that decision for myself?” Calum asks. “After all, it’s not like you’re dating him.”

“It’s not about dating,” Luke says, as if they’ve had this conversation before.

“How long do I have to come hang out at the flower shop before you realize you don’t have to do everything Michael says?"

"It’s not _about_ doing everything he says, and I do _not_ have to do everything he says, he just happens to be right about this. You’re better off without me.”

“But you like me,” Calum says, voice getting softer. Ashton would have mistaken it for sadness if he wasn’t watching Calum run his fingers up Luke’s arm.

“That’s not what this is about and you know it. Now please, Calum, go home.” Luke pulls his arm away, and then watches sadly as Calum huffs and walks away. Luke sits down on the front steps of the building. Ashton only watches for a moment before he sees Calum get to the end of the street and sit cross legged on the sidewalk. There are no people walking by, or else he would definitely be in the way.

**To talk to Luke, go to[chapter 8](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67251889). To talk to Calum, go to [chapter 9](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67251922).**


	5. Chapter 5

Ashton watches Michael walk away and then trains his eyes back on the vampire in the darkness. The vampire sighs deeply, but keeps swinging his legs back and forth. Ashton leans over when his foot starts to fall asleep where he’s crouched, and he must make a noise because the vampire stops swinging his legs, eyes narrowing on Ashton’s chosen bush even though he’s mostly sure he can’t be seen. As soon as the vampire turns away, Ashton takes the opportunity to move his foot to a better position, but by then, with no noise at all, the vampire has disappeared. Ashton looks around for a moment, wondering if maybe he just leapt off the swings in such a way that let him land without making a loud noise, but aside from the swing in motion, there’s no sign he was even there.

Ashton crawls out of the bush, shaking the pins and needles out of his foot, and looks around once more. There are no other people, and he considers himself lucky because if anyone saw him in a bush by a playground, he wouldn’t be able to convince them he was spying on a vampire, or at the very least an adult human, because there was no one there. He looks up to the sky, knowing fully well that vampires turning into bats is just a myth, though he does see some bats flying overhead. Ashton shakes his head a little, like an etch-a-sketch, to reset his mind. He decides there’s nothing left for him to do now, so he heads home for the night.

From watching the vampires in the past, he knows where they live, so he decides to go there the next morning, bright and early. He’s sitting in his car down the street, pretending to be on his phone while he discretely watches the door of their apartment building for either of them coming or going. The vampire he was watching the night before – not Michael – leaves first, and Ashton follows his car to a little strip of hipster shops. He questions the urgency of going shopping first thing in the morning until he realizes the vampire has taken the back entrance, so he must be an employee. Ashton counts the number of doors from the end, and then walks around the front where he counts again and sees through the window that the vampire in question is wearing a dark green apron in a little plant shop.

The window is decorated with plants in decorative hangers, all with price tags, and then there are little flower pots in bloom along the back wall, which is the only wall he can see clearly through the forest that is the window. He would be surprised if there wasn’t a tall shelf lined with succulents in a shop like this. He eyes the door and sees that the shop doesn’t open for another fifteen minutes, and he doesn’t want to come across as a memorably bad customer who walks into a closed business, so he decides to loiter across the street at the Starbucks, which is both predictably open and unfortunately out of place among the other independent businesses.

He’s sure the barista rolls her eyes when he orders a black coffee, but he doesn’t really care. He patiently waits until five minutes past opening time before making his way back to the plant shop. As soon as he walks in, he’s greeted by the smell of _green_. It’s a stark change to the smell of sunshine and cars outside. He sees the vampire at a counter out of the corner of his eye, but makes his way around the room too keep up appearances. He gets a bit lost in the shelf that has a little guide in chalk showing how to build your own terrarium, and if he knew he was going straight home after this, he would have been even more tempted. There were little glass bowls of different sizes, little plants to stick in the bowls, different types of soil, different colored mosses, little rocks and crystals…

“Would you like help with anything?” a voice asks, startling him out of his plant-based reverie. Ashton turns around to see the vampire – Luke, according to his name tag – looking at him expectantly. In the daylight, he’s actually kind of… pretty?

“No, I’m just looking,” Ashton says, stumbling over his words just enough that he notices but hopefully Luke doesn’t. If he does, he’s polite enough not to mention it.

“Let me know if you change your mind,” Luke says, returning to his counter where he’s in the middle of doing a flower arrangement in a little vase. Ashton moves past the temptation of the terrariums and busies himself looking at the flowers while eyeing Luke, who’s meticulously clipping all the stems to just the right length before putting them in the vase, and then turning it so he can see it looks good from all angles. He doesn’t seem like a vampire in this setting. He seems extremely human, in fact, almost too soft even for that.

His poor timing means there’s no one else in the shop, and unfortunately this isn’t the type of place he can just hang out for hours with no purpose without looking weird. He has to leave, but it suddenly dawns on Ashton that he has to buy _something_ before leaving. He looks around, not wanting to buy flowers just to leave them in his car all day to dry out. He can’t very well buy a plant for anyone else; it’s not like he has any friends in town to give plants as gifts. If he’s spending money, he might as well build himself a terrarium.

He’s just picked out a tiny glass plant hanger when the bell above the door rings. A man walks in and Luke’s gaze goes from politely interested to a scowl, and Ashton hopes it’s because Luke knows him and not for vampiric reasons.

“What are you doing here Calum?” Luke asks.

“I can’t just come hang out because I like spending time with you?” Calum asks, fake innocence dripping from his voice.

“We both know why you’re here, and we also both know the only reason you’re not going and clinging to Michael at work is because if he tells you to leave, you’ll actually listen.”

“You act like I don’t like you.”

“You like me when Michael’s not around,” Luke scoffs, and Calum protests. Ashton doesn’t understand why someone would like Michael better than Luke, even though all his knowledge of both of them comes from observing from a distance. He forgets he’s supposed to be setting up a terrarium for a moment, and Luke happens to look up and catch his eye. Ashton feels his face growing warm from getting caught staring, but Luke places the vase he was working on up on the shelf behind him and gives Calum a customer service smile. “Now if you don’t mind, I have real customers who need help.” Luke walks over to him and starts explaining the different types of soil and which plants should go in which ones, which is technically not something he knows much about, but he’s paying more attention to the sound of Luke’s voice than his words. Calum doesn’t leave, just sits in a chair by the back door, so Ashton assumes this is something that happens often.

Ashton zones back in just in time to hear the final combination of air plants and moss, so he plucks some dark green moss out of the little wooden drawer and takes his time lining the bottom of the terrarium with it, enjoying having Luke’s eyes on him even if it is just because he’s set on ignoring Calum. Luke picks up one of the air plants and points out how some of them have fuzzy leaves and some are pointy, and Ashton has almost decided there’s no way on earth Luke can be a vampire, because no one this reminiscent of a sunflower could possibly be dangerous. “You know a lot about plants, huh?” Ashton asks.

Luke laughs lightly. “It’s kind of my job,” he says.

Ashton picks out one of the plants with the fuzzy leaves and gestures to Calum. “What’s with him?” he ventures.

“Oh, he has a crush on my roommate but he’s too scared to do anything about it, so he bugs me instead.”

“And you let him?”

“We’re kinda friends, I’d feel bad kicking him out if he’s not doing anything wrong.”

Ashton starts to understand what Luke meant earlier about Calum listening when Michael tells him to leave. “So you’re a pushover, okay,” he teases, picking out a shiny blue crystal to add to his build.

“I am not,” Luke says indignantly.

“No, it’s cute,” Ashton says, and then looks down at his hands intently so Luke can’t see him biting his tongue for slipping up.

“Well, thanks,” Luke says. Ashton can hear the smile on his face. Luke hands him a little tiger’s eye stone and returns to the register to help Ashton check out.

Ashton can’t ask Calum any probing questions with Luke standing right there, so he checks out and leaves with his little terrarium wrapped in bubble wrap and tucked into a white paper bag. He decides to go home to drop off his new plant and eat some lunch before going back to wait outside Luke’s apartment – which feels creepier now that Ashton isn’t sure Luke is a vampire at all.

He’s only there for about ten minutes before Luke gets home. Calum climbs out of the passenger side, and Luke is on the phone. Calum is protesting after every sentence. “I don’t know, Mike. He showed up, and he won’t leave, so if you wanna tell him yourself—” Calum looks offended. “I _know_ I shouldn’t have brought him home but it’s not like he doesn’t know where we live.” Luke looks back at Calum. “He’s not giving up.”

“Damn right I’m not,” Calum says loudly behind Luke. Luke waves his hand aggressively at Calum. They’re at the front door by then, and Luke sits down on the steps. “What are we doing?” Calum asks.

Luke hangs up and looks at Calum, and then they’re talking too quietly for Ashton to hear. Michael shows up about five minutes later, looking mildly upset that Calum is there, but Luke still looks more upset. Fairly so, Ashton supposes, if Calum and Michael like each other. Luke ducks inside the building and then Calum and Michael are left talking quietly. Michael must say something upsetting, because Calum pouts and then gets up and walks away. Luke was right, Michael is better at getting Calum to leave. Calum walks to the end of the block and sits down on the sidewalk.

**To talk to Michael, go to[chapter 10](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67251979). To talk to Calum, go to [chapter 11](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67252018).**


	6. Chapter 6

Calum ignores Luke’s withering stare in favor of grinning at Michael, who possibly blushes in return but it’s dark so Calum can’t really tell. “Have you given any thought to what I brought up last time?” Calum asks.

Michael sighs, predictably. “No, and neither should you,” he says.

“But—”

“Calum, maybe your family is right about you being crazy,” Luke says, and Michael elbows him.

“Ignore him,” Michael says to Calum. “But neither of us is going to accept your offer, and you’re better off forgetting the whole thing.”

Calum knows he’s not going to get either of them to say the word _vampire_ out loud, not after the way Luke freaked out the first time about hunters. Michael had seemed confident in saying hunters didn’t exist anymore, and then Calum pointed out that most people didn’t think vampires existed anymore either, and now none of them say the word in public. He puts on his best puppy dog eyes and looks at Michael, but quickly pulls back when Michael glares at him.

“We’re not about to put you in danger because you don’t know what’s good for you,” Michael says sharply. Calum watches them walk into the park and disappear into a grove of trees, and then he looks up at the sky to watch a group of bats – mostly real, at least two vampires – fly across the sky. With nothing left to do there, he goes home, but not without a plan for his day off tomorrow.

The next day, Calum goes to the flower shop where Luke works. There’s already a customer inside by the time he gets there, only ten minutes into the shop being open. He hadn’t wanted to seem too eager, but looks like he shouldn’t have worried. Luke is arranging some flowers and eyeing the customer curiously when Calum walks in. He immediately walks up to Luke, who frowns at him.

“What are you doing here Calum?” Luke asks.

“I can’t just come hang out because I like spending time with you?” Calum asks, feigning innocence.

“We both know why you’re here, and we also both know the only reason you’re not going and clinging to Michael at work is because if he tells you to leave, you’ll actually listen.”

“You act like I don’t like you.”

“You like me when Michael’s not around,” Luke scoffs, and Calum protests. Luke turns around and puts the arrangement up on the display shelf behind him before giving Calum a practiced customer service smile. “Now if you don’t mind, I have real customers who need help.” Luke leaves Calum to go talk to the customer.

Calum listens in on Luke and the customer as they maybe-flirt, and then starts to zone out until he hears his name, followed by Luke telling this stranger that Calum has a crush on Michael. Calum scowls, and then as soon as the customer leaves, he interrupts Luke’s slightly lovelorn gaze by walking up to the counter and frowning at him.

“What?” Luke asks.

“I just don’t understand why you and Michael don’t take me seriously,” he says, and that’s how the conversation goes throughout the morning until Luke’s coworker comes in for the afternoon shift and Luke can go home.

Calum follows him. Luke knows Calum is following him. This happens often.

Calum follows as Luke clambers out of his car, already on the phone with Michael, yelling about Calum. Luke keeps defending himself against Michael, who apparently thinks that Luke should also know better. If Calum didn’t have a tiny little crush on Michael, he’d be open to Luke turning him without Michael’s approval. As it was, he’d come to the conclusion that he’d be open to them turning him at the same time if that’s what it took.

Luke hangs up and looks at Calum when they get to the front door of the apartment complex. He knows that Luke isn’t unlocking the door because he doesn’t want Calum following him up. Instead, Luke starts giving him a repeat of the same lecture he’s heard a million times and yet has done nothing to deter him from wanting to be a vampire. It’s dangerous, it’s a permanent decision, it’s not something to take lightly, etc.

Michael shows up about five minutes later, looking disappointed that Luke hasn’t managed to make him leave. As soon as he arrives, Luke sneaks inside, pulling the door shut behind himself. Michael pins Calum with a look comparable to his mother when she was upset at his bad grades when he was a kid. Calum can’t help but be a little sorry. “You bother Luke at work all day and then follow him home?” Michael says. That’s not the part Calum thought he was upset about, but it’s still a fair point.

“I have the day off work,” Calum says quietly.

“So you spent the whole morning being irritating? Not a good way to convince him to help you.”

“You’re saying I have a chance?”

“Fuck no. Go home, Calum.”

“So… I should have spent the morning bothering you instead?” Calum asks, and something in Michael’s face softens just a little.

“Go _home_ , Calum,” Michael repeats.

Calum exaggerates a pout and starts to walk away, and then the pout turns real when he hears the building door shut.

**To sit and be sad about it, go to[chapter 12](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67252066). To go home, go to [chapter 13](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67252093).**


	7. Chapter 7

Calum looks past Michael’s scowl to Luke, who already looks sorry for what he’s about to say. “Have you given any thought to what I brought up last time?” Calum asks.

“No—” Michael cuts in.

“I’m not talking to you,” Calum says. If he can’t sweet talk Luke into turning him, maybe he can annoy Michael into it. Luke won’t let Michael drain him.

“I’m not going to say yes,” Luke says. “I’m never going to agree.”

“Calum, maybe your family is right about you being crazy,” Michael says, and Luke frowns at him.

“Ignore him,” Luke says to Calum. “But neither of us is going to accept your offer, and you’re better off forgetting the whole thing.”

Calum knows he’s not going to get either of them to say the word _vampire_ out loud, not after the way Luke freaked out the first time about hunters. Michael had seemed confident in saying hunters didn’t exist anymore, and then Calum pointed out that most people didn’t think vampires existed anymore either, and now none of them say the word in public. He puts on his best puppy dog eyes and looks at Luke, but quickly pulls back when Michael glares at him.

“We’re not about to put you in danger because you don’t know what’s good for you,” Michael says sharply. Calum watches them walk into the park and disappear into a grove of trees, and then he looks up at the sky to watch a group of bats – mostly real, at least two vampires – fly across the sky. With nothing left to do there, he goes home, but not without a plan for his day off tomorrow.

The next day, Calum goes to the flower shop where Luke works. Luke is arranging some flowers when Calum walks in. He immediately goes up to Luke, who frowns at him.

“What are you doing here today, Calum?” Luke asks.

“I can’t just come hang out because I like spending time with you?” Calum asks, feigning innocence.

“We both know why you’re here.”

“Okay fine,” Calum concedes. “But I do like spending time with you.”

“I’m supposed to believe that?”

Calum leans his elbows onto the counter. “It’s true.”

“And I suppose you’re not going to leave until my shift is over?”

“How else do I prove I like spending time with you?” Calum asks.

Luke shakes his head but smiles as Calum pulls up a chair from along the back wall. He’s been told off for standing behind the counter one too many times, so now he just sits beside it. Luke’s as good as the boss these days anyway, since he got promoted and the owner doesn’t really come in.

Calum sits and chats with Luke whenever he’s behind the counter in between helping customers. He gets a few questioning looks from customers who can’t tell if he works there, but Luke is in an apron and he’s not. By the end of Luke’s shift, Calum has spent about an hour flirting with him, and has offered to buy Luke lunch twice, both of which he’s been rejected because Luke doesn’t eat food and he refuses to take Calum to the blood bar, even when Calum offers to pay for his drinks for the night. (“That’s not now it works,” he’d been informed.)

Calum follows Luke home. Luke knows Calum is following him. This happens often.

Calum follows as Luke clambers out of his car, already on the phone with Michael, talking about Calum. Luke keeps defending himself against Michael, who apparently thinks that Luke should also know better. If Calum wasn’t a little intimidated by Michael, he’d be open to Luke turning him without Michael’s approval. As it was, he’d come to the conclusion that he’d be open to them turning him at the same time if that’s what it took.

Luke hangs up and looks at Calum when they get to the front door of the apartment complex. He knows that Luke isn’t unlocking the door because he doesn’t want Calum following him up. Instead, Luke starts giving him a repeat of the same lecture he’s heard a million times and yet has done nothing to deter him from wanting to be a vampire. It’s dangerous, it’s a permanent decision, it’s not something to take lightly, etc.

Michael joins them and declares that Calum is an idiot, and then yells at Luke for a change, and then more at Calum for how much of an idiot he really is. Luke shushes Michael a second time, and then Michael goes inside, leaving Calum staring at Luke, feeling no less determined but maybe a little ashamed.

Luke pushes at Calum’s elbow so that they’re both walking toward the street, and they stop there. “Sorry about him,” Luke says. “But he’s right. You can’t keep doing this.”

“Shouldn’t I be able to make that decision for myself?” Calum asks. “After all, it’s not like you’re dating him.”

“It’s not about dating,” Luke says. Calum knows he might have more luck if he gave up on getting turned and settled for staying human and dating Luke, but then Luke would always think he was just playing the long game. He hadn’t _planned_ on crushing on one of the vampires he’d chosen to turn him.

“How long do I have to come hang out at the flower shop before you realize you don’t have to do everything Michael says?"

“But you _like_ me,” Calum says, voice getting softer, reaching out to touch Luke’s arm.

“That’s not what this is about and you know it. Now please, Calum, go home.” Luke pulls his arm away, and then turns to go inside. Calum huffs and walks away. He gets to the corner where the sidewalk leads to the parking lot and sighs.

**To sit and be sad about it, go to[chapter 14](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67252192). To go home, go to [chapter 15](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67252723).**


	8. Chapter 8

Ashton pulls a random restaurant name from his memory of the city and hopes it isn’t too close. He gets out of his car and walks up to Luke, who looks wary when he approaches.

“Hey, I don’t want to bother you, but can you tell me how to get to North Italia? The restaurant? I can’t find the directions my friend gave me—”

“Can’t you put it in google maps?” Luke asks.

“I don’t believe in GPS services. Satellites watching us, and all that.”

Luke blinks at him a couple times and raises his eyebrows. “Oh.” He pulls out his phone. “What was the name of the place?”

Ashton repeats the name and watches Luke type it in. “Thanks for the help,” he says before the address loads.

“No worries,” Luke says.

“D’you like Italian food?” Ashton asks quickly, hoping he’s being subtle. The directions have popped up and Luke will read them out to him and then he won’t have a reason to stick around asking questions.

“Sometimes,” Luke replies. “I’m vegan, so, lots of cheese…”

Sounds like a bad coverup to Ashton, but he can’t exactly pin a vampire for a dietary preference. No normal person would criticize…

Luke looks up at him, frowning confusedly. “Directions?”

“Yeah, I’m ready,” he says, and then Luke starts spitting out the directions to him. Ashton can only nod and thank him before going back to his car. Luke is watching him, so he pulls onto the street and drives past Calum, who by then is getting into his own car. Nowhere else to go, he thinks, unless he drives around the block and goes back to staking out the apartment, but if Luke is still sitting on the front steps, he’ll know Ashton’s car. Better to give it some time before he goes back.

**To go home, go to[chapter 18](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67253077). To loop around the block and follow Calum home, go to [chapter 19](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67253203).**


	9. Chapter 9

Ashton waits a moment until Luke goes inside and then gets out of his car. He walks down the sidewalk to where Calum is sitting and pouting. Calum looks up as he approaches, but doesn’t move out of the way. “You okay?” Ashton ventures.

“Yeah,” Calum says.

“Relationship troubles?” Ashton asks, hoping Calum is the type to spill his heart out to a stranger, and that he was so preoccupied with Luke that he didn’t notice Ashton in the car just down the street.

“You heard that?” Calum asks dejectedly. Ashton nods even though Calum doesn’t look up. “Yeah, it’s definitely relationship troubles.”

“You’re not gonna get up?” Ashton is hoping they can move a little farther away from where Luke or Michael could walk back outside and hear them, especially if he’s going to ask Calum all the questions he needs to ask, but Calum doesn’t move.

“Too sad,” Calum says. “My whole family thinks I’m crazy, but I told Luke that’s fine with me, but then he said I deserve better than him and I don’t think that’s true I think he just doesn’t trust me, which is crazy because I can’t help who I am and neither can he but I still want him to—” Calum stops short and looks up at Ashton. “I’m telling all this to a random stranger, maybe I am crazy.”

Ashton would love to tell himself that Calum’s story lines up with Luke being a vampire, but it could also add up to plain old homophobia, which sucks for Calum. “Maybe you’re not crazy. Maybe your family is.”

“Nah, they love me, they support me, they just… don’t get it.”

Calum continues to stare blankly at the road. Ashton wonders if he should offer any real help or stick to his target. “You can’t go hang out where he works and win him over?”

“Why are you so invested in this?” Calum looks up. “You don’t even know me.”

“I’m a romantic?” Ashton says. It’s not a lie, although he can’t remember the last real date he went on.

“Well, there’s only so long I can hang out in Luke’s flower shop before the pollen starts to give me a headache or I have to go to my own job.”

Luke works in a flower shop? A barista and a florist, neither job befitting a vampire as far as Ashton could tell. Maybe he was wrong about them, maybe they’re just humans who don’t sleep, maybe—

“I should go before someone steps on me,” Calum says.

**To ask Calum about vampires, go to[chapter 16](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67252777). To let him go and then scope out the flower shop, go to [chapter 17](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67252798).**


	10. Chapter 10

Ashton pulls a random restaurant name from his memory of the city and hopes it isn’t too close. He gets out of his car and walks up to Michael, who looks wary when he approaches.

“Hey, I don’t want to bother you, but can you tell me how to get to North Italia? The restaurant? I can’t find the directions my friend gave me—”

“Just put it in google maps?” Michael says like it’s obvious.

“I don’t believe in GPS services. Satellites watching us, and all that.”

Michael blinks at him a couple times and then bursts out laughing. “You’re one of _those_ people. Okay.” He calms down enough to shake his head and pull out his phone. “What was the name of the place?”

Ashton repeats the name and watches Michael type it in. “Thanks for the help,” he says before the address loads.

“No problem,” Michael says.

“D’you like Italian food?” Ashton asks quickly, hoping he’s being subtle. The directions have popped up and Michael will read them out to him and then he won’t have a reason to stick around asking questions.

“Sometimes,” Michael replies. “I gotta be careful with it.”

“Garlic allergy?”

Michael looks at him, frowning confusedly. “Lactose intolerant,” he says, and then starts spitting out the directions to Ashton. Ashton can only nod and thank him before going back to his car. Michael is watching him, so he pulls onto the street and drives past Calum, who by then is getting into his own car. Nowhere else to go, he thinks, unless he drives around the block and goes back to staking out the apartment, but if Michael is still sitting on the front steps, he’ll recognize Ashton’s car. Better to give it some time before he goes back.

**To go home, go to[chapter 22](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67253536). To loop around the block and follow Calum home, go to [chapter 23](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67253866).**


	11. Chapter 11

Ashton waits a moment until Michael goes inside and then gets out of his car. He walks down the sidewalk to where Calum is sitting and pouting. Calum looks up as he approaches, but doesn’t move out of the way. “You okay?” Ashton ventures.

“Yeah,” Calum says.

“Relationship troubles?” Ashton asks, hoping Calum is the type to spill his heart out to a stranger, and that he was so preoccupied with Michael that he didn’t notice Ashton in the car just down the street.

“You heard that?” Calum asks dejectedly. Ashton nods even though Calum doesn’t look up. “Yeah, it’s definitely relationship troubles.”

“You’re not gonna get up?” Ashton is hoping they can move a little farther away from where Luke or Michael could walk back outside and hear them, especially if he’s going to ask Calum all the questions he needs to ask, but Calum doesn’t move.

“Too sad,” Calum says. “My whole family thinks I’m crazy, but I told Luke that’s fine with me, but then he said I deserve better than him and I don’t think that’s true I think he just doesn’t trust me, which is crazy because I can’t help who I am and neither can he but I still want him to—” Calum stops short and looks up at Ashton. “I’m telling all this to a random stranger, maybe I am crazy.”

Ashton would love to tell himself that Calum’s story lines up with Luke being a vampire, but it could also add up to plain old homophobia, which sucks for Calum. “Maybe you’re not crazy. Maybe your family is.”

“Nah, they love me, they support me, they just… don’t get it.”

Calum continues to stare blankly at the road. Ashton wonders if he should offer any real help or stick to his target. “You can’t go hang out where he works and win him over?”

“Why are you so invested in this?” Calum looks up. “You don’t even know me.”

“I’m a romantic?” Ashton says. It’s not a lie, although he can’t remember the last real date he went on.

“Well, there’s only so long I can hang out in a flower shop before the pollen starts to give me a headache or I have to go to my own job.”

Luke works in a flower shop? A barista and a florist, neither job befitting a vampire as far as Ashton could tell. Maybe he was wrong about them, maybe they’re just humans who don’t sleep, maybe—

“I should go before someone steps on me,” Calum says.

**To ask Calum about vampires, go to[chapter 20](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67253389). To let him go and then scope out the flower shop, go to [chapter 21](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67253518).**


	12. Chapter 12

Calum gets to the end of the sidewalk before he just sits down right there.

He’s only starting to consider getting up when someone walks up to him. The guy looks weirdly familiar, but doesn’t introduce himself, so he assumes it’s a coincidence. “You okay?” the guy asks.

“Yeah,” Calum says.

“Relationship troubles?”

“You heard that?” Calum asks, wondering who this guy is to care. Not that empathetic people don’t exist, but usually not so conveniently.

“You’re not gonna get up?”

“Too sad,” Calum says simply. “My whole family thinks I’m crazy, but I told Michael that’s fine with me, but he keeps saying I deserve better than him and I don’t think that’s true I think he just doesn’t trust me, which is crazy because I can’t help who I am and neither can he but I still want him to—” Calum stops short before he accidentally slips up and says something that sounds more like vampire and less like just regular old human crush. He looks up at the guy. “I’m telling all this to a random stranger, maybe I am crazy.”

“Maybe you’re not crazy. Maybe your family is.”

“Nah, they love me, they support me, they just… don’t get it.”

“You can’t go hang out where he works and win him over?”

“Why are you so invested in this?” Calum looks up. “You don’t even know me.”

“I’m a romantic.” It sounds like a question. Calum gets the feeling this guy is trying to keep up a conversation for more reasons than just to make sure he’s okay, though he can’t tell why yet.

“He would just tell me to leave again. And then I would be crazy, because I’d be the person doing the same thing and expecting different results.”

“You know what’s crazy?” the guy asks. There’s a slight shift in his tone that Calum picks up on. “I heard someone talking about seeing a vampire the other day. At least you’re just having relationship troubles.”

Calum narrows his eyes. Suddenly he places that this is the same guy from the plant shop, the one Luke was flirting with. If he’s asking about vampires, and coincidentally in the same place as Luke twice in a row, that’s not a coincidence. He could be a hunter. Sure, Michael said they didn’t exist, but better safe than sorry.

**To go warn Michael and Luke, go to[chapter 24](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67253896). To dig deeper on the stranger, go to [chapter 25](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67253914).**


	13. Chapter 13

Calum decides to go home, with no discernable reason to stick around to try and get Michael to talk to him more. He’s learned it’s best to let Michael do the talking until he’s ready to hear what Calum has to say, which won’t be anytime soon now that Michael is annoyed with him. He decides on his way home that he’ll go by the coffee shop the next morning on his way to work, to talk to Michael and maybe apologize for bothering Luke, and maybe even to ask for a heart on his latte if Michael doesn’t seem attached to the idea of hating him forever.

Calum leaves for work early and stops by the coffee shop as planned, but the morning doesn’t progress according to plan from there. Sure, he orders a latte, and sure, he bats his eyes at Michael a few times and Michael looks at him like he’s trying not to smile. Calum is waiting by the back counter for his drink when he sees a familiar face walk in. It only takes him a minute to place why he’s familiar.

Michael walks over with the drink in a cup without a lid, and Calum doesn’t think he’s overthinking Michael making a point of showing him the heart on top in foam before he pops a lid on. He’s about to walk away when Calum hisses his name.

“What?” Michael asks.

“I know that guy.” Calum gestures to the person he’s talking about.

“Who is he?”

Calum hesitates. “Okay, I don’t _know_ him, but he was at the flower shop yesterday.”

“Okay, and?”

Calum doesn’t know how to explain the weird feeling he has about the guy. He shrugs.

“He probably lives around here, I’m sure there’s an overlap between people who drink coffee and people who like houseplants. Besides, I’ve seen him here before.”

“How do you know he’s not… weird?”

“Weird?” Michael repeats. “Like you?”

Calum frowns and takes his latte. “Fine, I’ll prove it.” He walks up to the guy’s table and looks back at Michael, who shakes his head dismissively. The guy doesn’t seem to notice Calum until he’s pulled out the chair opposite where he’s set up his laptop. “Hi,” Calum says cheerily.

“Hello?” the guy says back. He looks a little confused, which is a fair reaction. At least he doesn’t seem to recognize Calum.

“I’m Calum, what’s your name?”

“Ashton?” the guy says slowly.

“Nice to meet you! What are you drinking?” Calum is aware he probably sounds crazy, but he can’t back down now.

“Black coffee,” Ashton replies. “Not very exciting.”

“Nice. I got a hazelnut latte. So what are you working on?”

“Research, for work.”

“You work in research? That’s cool, about what?”

Ashton stares at him for a moment. “Sorry, not that you’re not delightful company, but I don’t know you, and I really need to work.”

“This coffee shop’s a good place to work. I wish I could do my work here sometimes but unfortunately I have a boring office job.”

“Oh yeah? What do you do?” Ashton asks, suddenly matching his energy. Calum very consciously doesn’t react with surprise.

“I’m a glorified secretary at a law office. I keep thinking about going back to school to be a real lawyer, but I have plenty of time to do that.”

“Wouldn’t you rather do it now? Tomorrow’s never a sure thing.”

“What’s stopping me from seeing tomorrow? Or a hundred tomorrows? Or a million?” Calum doesn’t know what his point is, except that he’s trying to get Ashton to say something so that he can turn around and tell Michael he was right to get weird vibes. So far, he’s only weird for not acting like Calum’s being weird.

“Guess I was always taught the world is dangerous,” Ashton says, which is the first interesting thing he’s said this whole time.

“You know the chances of getting struck by lightning are very slim,” Calum informs him. “What do you mean, dangerous?”

“People aren’t always what they seem, that’s all.”

Calum leans in closer. “What are they?”

Ashton looks hesitant then. “Just, some people are bad.”

“Oh. Well, maybe, but that’s not dangerous.”

“Sometimes things that are bad are dangerous.”

Calum nods thoughtfully, but really he’s starting to wonder if Ashton is hinting at something he’s supposed to understand. The only “dangerous” connection between Luke and Michael was… “I should let you get to work. Actually, I should get to work myself.” Calum stands up, taking his drink with him. Ashton gives him a confused half-smile as he shuffles back to the counter to try and get Michael’s attention.

“What?” Michael asks when he’s waved over.

“His name’s Ashton,” Calum whispers through his teeth, in case Ashton is somehow great at reading lips.

“And?”

“I’ll text it to you.”

“This was all a way of asking me for my number?” Michael looks amused.

“No, but if it was would it have worked?”

Michael sighs and glances over his shoulder to make sure it’s not too busy. “Hand over your phone.” As he’s typing in his number, he adds, “If this is something stupid, I’m blocking your number.”

“It’s not,” Calum says.

Michael gives his phone back. “Now go to work before you get in trouble for being late.”

Calum smiles as he leaves.

**To text Michael about Ashton, go to[chapter 26](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254034). To flirt with Michael over text, go to [chapter 27](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254076).**


	14. Chapter 14

Calum sits down right there.

He’s only starting to consider getting up to go home when someone walks up to him. “You okay?” the guy asks.

“Yeah,” Calum says.

“Relationship troubles?”

“You heard that?” Calum asks, wondering who this guy is to care. Not that empathetic people don’t exist, but usually not so conveniently.

“You’re not gonna get up?”

“Too sad,” Calum says simply. “My whole family thinks I’m crazy, but I told Luke that’s fine with me, but he keeps saying I deserve better than him and I don’t think that’s true I think he just doesn’t trust me, which is crazy because I can’t help who I am and neither can he but I still want him to—” Calum stops short before he accidentally slips up and says something that sounds more like vampire and less like just regular old human crush. He looks up at the guy. “I’m telling all this to a random stranger, maybe I am crazy.”

“Maybe you’re not crazy. Maybe your family is.”

“Nah, they love me, they support me, they just… don’t get it.”

“You can’t go hang out where he works and win him over?”

“Why are you so invested in this?” Calum looks up. “You don’t even know me.”

“I’m a romantic.” It sounds like a question. Calum gets the feeling this guy is trying to keep up a conversation for more reasons than just to make sure he’s okay, though he can’t tell why yet.

“He would just tell me to leave again. And then I would be crazy, because I’d be the person doing the same thing and expecting different results.”

“You know what’s crazy?” the guy asks. There’s a slight shift in his tone that Calum picks up on. “I heard someone talking about seeing a vampire the other day. At least you’re just having relationship troubles.”

Calum narrows his eyes. If he’s asking about vampires, and coincidentally in the same place as Luke, that might not a coincidence. He could be a hunter. Sure, Michael said they didn’t exist, but better safe than sorry.

**To go warn Michael and Luke, go to[chapter 28](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254106). To dig deeper on the stranger, go to [chapter 25](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67253914).**


	15. Chapter 15

Calum can’t think of a reason to go back inside and talk to Luke, especially after Luke has not only rejected him wanting to be turned, but wanting to be together. Calum hopes Luke doesn’t think he’s using him as a way to get to being a vampire, which wouldn’t be totally unfounded a claim although it took one conversation for him to realize he liked Luke. He’s a little tired of trying so hard. Unlike what his family thinks, he’s not a terribly impulsive person. However, it takes him all of an hour to decide to move back home, and no longer than that to call his family and let them know he’s coming home. They don’t ask him if he’s given up on becoming a vampire, and he doesn’t tell them; they’ll find out on their own once he’s there and he starts eating garlic again.

Calum decides if he’s not spending all his time chasing vampires, it’s time for him to finally get a dog. He drags his dad to a shelter with him and falls in love with a tiny, fluffy little creature who happens to be named Luke. Calum considers changing the dog’s name, but it wouldn’t be fair to the dog, plus this way he has a small reminder of the love he lost back in Austin.

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Human Luke dead end was inspired by [Bella's](https://clumsyclifford.tumblr.com/) [Human Luke fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26789659) if you're interested in seeing how that au plays out. Love you bella *kissing heart emoji*


	16. Chapter 16

“They do define insanity as doing the same thing and expecting a different result,” Ashton says. “You know what’s really crazy though? I heard someone talking about seeing a vampire the other day. At least you’re just having relationship troubles.”

Calum looks up at him and narrows his eyes. “Vampires? You’re right, that is crazy.”

“Yeah, haven’t heard much crazier,” Ashton says. “Do you know anything about them?”

“What do you mean, do I _know_ anything about them?” Calum asks. “Like, from movies and stuff? Sure, my sister was obsessed with Twilight for a while like every other teenage girl.”

“I meant more like, real life.”

“Why do you ask?”

Ashton shrugs. “Curiosity?”

“What’s your name?” Calum asks, and Ashton hesitates for a moment before telling him. “Well, Ashton, if you tell anyone this, I’ll have to kill you,” Calum says, voice getting quieter. Ashton leans in closer. “When I was a kid and people asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, my answer was a vampire for a solid few years. I think I just liked the idea of having an excuse to stay up past my bedtime.” Calum chuckles at his own memory, and Ashton has to admit it’s a cute story, but it’s not anywhere near what he’s looking for.

“What made you give up your dream?” Ashton asks.

“You make it sound so dramatic, damn. I grew up and learned that vampires are made up. I’m not _that_ crazy.” Calum stands up.

“Are you leaving?” Ashton asks.

“Yeah, I’m gonna go try and talk to Luke again, you’ve inspired me. Convinced me I’m not as crazy as I think. Thanks.” Calum leaves toward the apartment building, and Ashton is left with nothing to do but go home, look over his research, and start over the next day.

**To go home, go to[chapter 30](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254379).**


	17. Chapter 17

Ashton decides to let Calum go back his relationship issues, wondering if he’s really just clueless that the guy he has a crush on is a vampire, or if he knows and isn’t telling.

When he gets to the flower shop, he realizes obviously Luke won’t be there for him to ask questions, so he settles for snooping around instead. He looks intently at the display shelves beside the check-out counter until the girl working there walks out to help a customer, and then he ducks down and starts rifling through the contents on the low shelves. It’s mostly plant care books and highlighted schedules for watering and things like that. He finds a pencil pouch tucked at the back that says “extra cash” and hides it back where he found it. He’s flipping through the contents of a folder – more information on orders and shipments – when the girl comes back and looks at him, mildly horrified.

Ashton shoves the folder back onto the shelf and stands up, giving her an awkward smile and walking out from behind the counter. “Sorry, I was… looking for plant information.”

She raises an eyebrow. “The info sheets are on the wall over there.” She gestures to the far wall, where there’s a wooden shelf lined with racks of different pamphlets.

“Right, thanks,” Ashton says. He can feel her eyes on him as he walks away, so he pretends to peruse the pamphlets, and then picks one up at random before he leaves the building.

Outside, he shoves the pamphlet about monstera plants in his back pocket and stops the first random people he sees, a couple walking their dog. “Excuse me, do you know anything about the vampire who works here?”

The couple look at each other and they both shake their heads no, seeming bewildered at the question. _People these days just don’t know about the dangers surrounding them_ , Ashton thinks to himself as the couple shuffles quickly past him.

He’s had about enough of stalking vampires for the day, and he’s made no progress aside from making a handful of people think he’s crazy, so he packs up and goes home. It’s not until after dinner when he’s diligently washing his chopsticks to reuse as wooden spikes that he comes up with the idea to just make friends with them. He can start with Michael, since he’s presumably bought coffee there enough times to carry a conversation.

**If this is a good plan, go to[chapter 31](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254415). If it’s a bad plan, go to [chapter 32](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254442).**


	18. Chapter 18

Ashton goes home and looks over his research on these two vampires, and finds nothing of substance. He knows where they live and where they work, and that’s about it. Food preferences and intolerances do not a vampire make. Plus, one works in a coffee shop. The other is a florist. The juice bar they frequent – after all, he has been inside – is just a bar. They’re just two roommates with weird sleeping habits and that’s all. It starts as a crisis about Michael and Luke, and ends in a crisis about whether vampires are real at all, and maybe his whole childhood was just some weird, cult-like joke.

Ashton considers calling one of his family members, but he’s not sure they wouldn’t be disappointed in him. One of his uncles told him to call if he ever needed help, but Ashton is sure he meant the vampire _killing_ kind of help, not the vampire _identifying_ kind. He used to be so good at this when he was young, but what changed? Maybe his heart just isn’t in it anymore. He decides not to call anyone, and instead writes a letter to his mom. He doesn’t send it yet.

He’s had paints in a box on a shelf that he never unpacked since he’d moved in. He opens the box and turns the lid of the box upside down so he has a blank space to start painting over. The colors and patterns come back to him like he’d never stopped, and over the next few days, every possible surface – that he won’t have to pay to replace – is covered in artwork, from doodles to sketches to full paintings. He orders a pack of canvases in various sizes, and in no time, those are covered too. He sends some pictures to his old art professor, who seems surprised to hear from him but still encourages him to pursue this if it’s something he’s passionate about. He decides to move to the desert where he’ll have more space to paint.

Before he leaves town, he mails a painting to his mom along with the letter to tell her he’s quitting the family business. He considers going back to the coffee shop one last time to say goodbye to Michael, just because he kinda misses how cute he is, but he decides a clean break is better. He moves to Utah without looking back.

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Off-Screen dead end was inspired by [M's](https://allsassnoclass.tumblr.com/) [Off-Screen](http://www.archiveofourown.org/works/23967202) fic if you're interested in seeing how that au plays out! (spoiler alert: it's cuter and less tragic than this)


	19. Chapter 19

Ashton follows Calum as he drives a few miles and arrives at presumably his own apartment. Ashton has no reason to stay and keep an eye on Calum’s apartment, and neither Michael or Luke is likely to leave again tonight, so he figures he’s had enough of stalking vampires for the day and goes home. It’s not until after dinner when he’s diligently washing his chopsticks to reuse as wooden spikes that he comes up with the idea to just make friends with them. He can start with Michael, since he’s presumably bought coffee there enough times to carry a conversation.

**If this is a good plan, go to[chapter 31](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254415). If it’s a bad plan, go to [chapter 32](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254442).**


	20. Chapter 20

“They do define insanity as doing the same thing and expecting a different result,” Ashton says. “You know what’s really crazy though? I heard someone talking about seeing a vampire the other day. At least you’re just having relationship troubles.”

Calum looks up at him and narrows his eyes. “Vampires? You’re right, that is crazy.”

“Yeah, haven’t heard much crazier,” Ashton says. “Do you know anything about them?”

“What do you mean, do I _know_ anything about them?” Calum asks. “Like, from movies and stuff? Sure, my sister was obsessed with Twilight for a while like every other teenage girl.”

“I meant more like, real life.”

“Why do you ask?”

Ashton shrugs. “Curiosity?”

“What’s your name?” Calum asks, and Ashton hesitates for a moment before telling him. “Well, Ashton, if you tell anyone this, I’ll have to kill you,” Calum says, voice getting quieter. Ashton leans in closer. “When I was a kid and people asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, my answer was a vampire for a solid few years. I think I just liked the idea of having an excuse to stay up past my bedtime.” Calum chuckles at his own memory, and Ashton has to admit it’s a cute story, but it’s not anywhere near what he’s looking for.

“What made you give up your dream?” Ashton asks.

“You make it sound so dramatic, damn. I grew up and learned that vampires are made up. I’m not _that_ crazy.” Calum stands up.

“Are you leaving?” Ashton asks.

“Yeah, I’m gonna go try and talk to Michael again, you’ve inspired me. Convinced me I’m not as crazy as I think. Thanks.” Calum leaves toward the apartment building, and Ashton is left with nothing to do but go home, look over his research, and start over the next day.

**To go back to the plant shop the next day, go to[chapter 33](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254469). To scope out Michael’s work, go to [chapter 29](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254253).**


	21. Chapter 21

Ashton decides to let Calum go back his relationship issues, wondering if he’s really just clueless that the guy he has a crush on is a vampire, or if he knows and isn’t telling.

When he gets to the flower shop, he realizes obviously Luke won’t be there for him to ask more questions, so he settles for snooping around instead. He looks intently at the display shelves beside the check-out counter until the girl working there walks out to help a customer, and then he ducks down and starts rifling through the contents on the low shelves. It’s mostly plant care books and highlighted schedules for watering and things like that. He finds a pencil pouch tucked at the back that says “extra cash” and hides it back where he found it. He’s flipping through the contents of a folder – more information on orders and shipments – when the girl comes back and looks at him, mildly horrified.

Ashton shoves the folder back onto the shelf and stands up, giving her an awkward smile and walking out from behind the counter. “Sorry, I was… looking for plant information.”

She raises an eyebrow. “The info sheets are on the wall over there.” She gestures to the far wall, where there’s a wooden shelf lined with racks of different pamphlets.

“Right, thanks,” Ashton says. He can feel her eyes on him as he walks away, so he pretends to peruse the pamphlets, and then picks one up at random before he leaves the building.

Outside, he shoves the pamphlet about monstera plants in his back pocket and stops the first random people he sees, a couple walking their dog. “Excuse me, do you know anything about the vampire who works here?”

The couple look at each other and they both shake their heads no, seeming bewildered at the question. _People these days just don’t know about the dangers surrounding them_ , Ashton thinks to himself as the couple shuffles quickly past him.

He’s had about enough of stalking vampires for the day, and he’s made no progress aside from making a handful of people think he’s crazy, so he packs up and goes home. It’s not until after dinner when he’s diligently washing his chopsticks to reuse as wooden spikes that he comes up with the idea to just make friends with them. He can start with Luke, since they’ve already had a conversation. He can go back to the flower shop with a question about his little terrarium plant and see if that leads to a real conversation, and he can decide what to do from there.

**If this is a good plan, go to[chapter 33](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254469). If it’s a bad plan, go to [chapter 34](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254490).**


	22. Chapter 22

Ashton has had about enough of stalking vampires for the day, and he’s made no progress aside from making a handful of people think he’s crazy, so he packs up and goes home. It’s not until after dinner when he’s diligently washing his chopsticks to reuse as wooden spikes that he comes up with the idea to just make friends with them. He can start with Luke, since they’ve already had a conversation. He can go back to the flower shop with a question about his little terrarium plant and see if that leads to a real conversation, and he can decide what to do from there.

**If this is a good plan, go to[chapter 33](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254469). If it’s a bad plan, go to [chapter 34](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254490).**


	23. Chapter 23

Ashton follows Calum as he drives a few miles and arrives at presumably his own apartment. Ashton has no reason to stay and keep an eye on Calum’s apartment, and neither Michael or Luke is likely to leave again tonight, so he figures he’s had enough of stalking vampires for the day and goes home. He looks over his research on these two vampires, and finds nothing of substance. He knows where they live and where they work, and that’s about it. Food preferences and intolerances do not a vampire make. Plus, one works in a coffee shop. The other is a florist. The juice bar they frequent – after all, he has been inside – is just a juice bar. They’re just two roommates with weird sleeping habits and that’s all. It starts as a crisis about Michael and Luke, and ends in a crisis about whether vampires are real at all, and maybe his whole childhood was just some weird, cult-like joke.

Ashton considers calling one of his family members, but he’s not sure they wouldn’t be disappointed in him. He vaguely wonders if faking his own death would be too dramatic. One of his uncles told him to call if he ever needed help, but Ashton is sure he meant the vampire _killing_ kind of help, not the vampire _identifying_ kind. He used to be so good at this when he was young, but what changed? Maybe his heart just isn’t in it anymore. He decides not to call anyone, and instead writes a letter to his mom. He doesn’t send it yet.

Ashton decides he’s had enough of living in this city and hunting vampires who may not even exist, so he points a dart at a map and throws it with his eyes closed. It lands off the coast of California, so despite his state of crisis, he decides to move to the nearest city on land instead of buying a boat to go live in the Pacific Ocean. On a whim, as he’s online trying to find a place to stay, he signs up for an improv class, as one does when they move to socal, he thinks. He also signs up for auditions for the host of a new reality show, because they’re taking place the day he’s due to arrive in the city, and if he makes it on time it’ll be like fate telling him he’s on the right track.

The day he leaves, he sends his mother the letter explaining that he’s leaving the family business, and asking her to wish him luck on his new endeavors as a charming new face on trashy prime time tv.

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Bachelor dead end was inspired by [Sam's](https://tirednotflirting.tumblr.com/) [Bachelor host fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25601497) if you're interested in seeing how that au plays out. Thank you again sam for being so encouraging, you're a gem!


	24. Chapter 24

“Vampires?” Calum scoffs. “You’re right, that is crazy.” He stands up hastily.

“Are you leaving?” the guy asks. Calum can tell he’s about to find a reason to keep talking to him, so he starts walking.

“Yeah, I’m gonna go try to talk to him again, you’ve, uh, inspired me.” Calum leaves him standing there looking kinda surprised as he speed-walks back to the apartment building’s door. He luckily gets there right as someone is leaving, so he doesn’t have to worry about how to get inside.

He runs up the stairs to the second floor and bangs on Michael’s and Luke’s door, not concerned with how much noise he’s making. No one will be asleep in the middle of the day to complain.

Luke pulls the door open and groans when he sees Calum, but Calum pushes past him. “You guys are in trouble.” Luke closes the door.

Michael looks up from where he’s been looking at his phone. “What?”

“There’s a hunter out there. I think he knows about you.”

“This better not be a ploy,” Michael says with a straight face.

“It’s not a ploy or a joke. Luke.” Calum turns to him. “The guy you were flirting with at the shop? It’s him!”

“Luke was flirting with someone?” Michael asks, sounding amused.

“Ashton?” Luke asks in disbelief.

“Didn’t hear you ask his name,” Calum says with a smirk, and Michael lets out a short laugh.

“I saw it on his credit card,” Luke says. “That’s not the point. How do you know he’s a hunter?”

“I just _saw_ him outside!” Calum says. “He was here just now, and he was at the shop, and then he asked me about vampires—”

“What did he ask?” Luke interrupts.

“I can’t remember exactly, but he mentioned them in a weird way and I got the feeling he was gonna try to get me to say something about you two, so I left.”

“You ran away?” Michael asks. “As if that’s not suspicious?”

“I spent the first five minutes of our conversation whining about _you_ so when I told him I was coming in to talk to you he probably believed me. I wasn’t about to leave him to come hunt you. Besides, he can’t kill me.”

“Technically it would be easier for him to kill you,” Luke says quietly.

Michael ignores him. “That’s oddly sweet,” he says.

“I’m a sweet person,” Calum replies sarcastically, but he notes that Michael sounded genuine.

“How did he find out about us?” Michael asks.

Calum shrugs. “I didn’t stay long enough to get any details. I had to warn you.”

“Sweet yet stupid,” Luke says.

“Well at least you know who he is,” Calum says to Luke.

“I can look through the transactions tomorrow to see if I can get more information on him.”

“You think it’s smart to go back to work after this?” Michael says. “He knows who you are.”

“If I don’t go back to work, he might figure out he tipped us off. Plus, I might find something helpful. Like his address.”

“Or his number.” Michael rolls his eyes. “So you can flirt with him more.”

“What should I do?” Calum asks.

“Stay out of it,” Luke says, but Michael waves him away as he walks up to Calum.

“Luke’s right, don’t get involved. But if you learn any more about him, text me.” Michael pulls Calum’s phone out of his hands where he’s been fiddling with it and then grabs Calum’s hand to press his thumb to the front to unlock it. Calum just watches as he types his number and name in. Calum catches Luke roll his eyes when Michael hands his phone back.

**To go back and look for Ashton, go to[chapter 35](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254535). To go home, go to [chapter 36](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254724).**


	25. Chapter 25

“A vampire?” Calum repeats. “You’re right, that is crazy.”

“Yeah, haven’t heard much crazier,” the guy says. “Do you know anything about them?”

“What do you mean, do I _know_ anything about them?” Calum asks. There’s no way this guy is asking just for fun. He’s trying to dig for information. “Like, from movies and stuff? Sure, my sister was obsessed with Twilight for a while like every other teenage girl.”

“I meant more like, real life.”

“Why do you ask?” Calum tries his best to ask casually, like someone who doesn’t know vampires exist.

Ashton shrugs. “Curiosity?”

“What’s your name?” Calum asks, and the guy hesitates for a moment.

“Ashton,” he says.

“Well, Ashton, if you tell anyone this, I’ll have to kill you,” Calum says, making his voice quieter. Ashton leans in closer. “When I was a kid and people asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, my answer was a vampire for a solid few years. I think I just liked the idea of having an excuse to stay up past my bedtime.” Calum chuckles at the story and how it had never really ended.

“What made you give up your dream?” Ashton asks.

“You make it sound so dramatic, damn. I grew up and learned that vampires are made up. I’m not _that_ crazy.” Calum stands up.

“Are you leaving?” Ashton asks.

“Yeah, I’m gonna go try and talk to him again, you’ve, uh, inspired me. Convinced me I’m not as crazy as I think. Thanks.” Calum leaves him standing there looking kinda surprised as he speed-walks back to the apartment building’s door. It’s locked when he gets there, and he doesn’t have a way to contact Michael or Luke, so he doesn’t have a way to get inside.

**To wait for someone to open the door, go to[chapter 37](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254736). To sneak back around and try to follow Ashton, go to [chapter 38](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254778).**


	26. Chapter 26

Calum goes to work and wastes no time telling Michael everything he knows – Ashton asked him weird questions and didn’t act like Calum was weird, which he definitely was – and then when Michael pretends the pieces don’t fit together right away, he gets to the point.

 _I think he’s a hunter_ , Calum sends.

 _Are you crazy?_ Michael sends back.

_Yeah you said hunters don’t exist anymore but he was at Luke’s work and yours in two days._

_So were you?_

_But I know you, he just gives me weird vibes_

_If all it takes is vibes to judge someone I would have stopped talking to you ages ago, besides how do I know this isn’t just another way for you to beg to be turned for ~protection~ or whatever_

Calum feels insulted in about three different ways, but he has to convince Michael he’s not just saying these things to get turned, especially when Michael not believing him could lead to him and Luke being in danger. _You saw me talk to him, right? He was being *weird*_

_Hunters don’t exist, you’re being paranoid_

Calum considers the idea that maybe Ashton is just a strange person who happened to be in both places on the same days that he was, but he can’t shake the feeling there’s more to him than that.

The next day, Calum calls in sick to work and makes it his mission to find Ashton. It isn’t hard, because of course Ashton is hovering outside the plant shop. Calum had figured out from the prior morning that Luke and Ashton didn’t know each other in any capacity outside the single interaction, so he intercepts Ashton before he can talk to Luke again. Calum entices him with knowledge of vampires, admitting that he had been playing dumb the day before, and then pulls out all his knowledge on the guy who turned Michael as the only vampire he knows of, because at the end of the day the point is that he doesn’t leave Michael vulnerable. To be fair, the longer they talk, the more Calum starts to think maybe dating a vampire wouldn’t be as good as he’s imagined, and maybe _being_ one would be even worse. Ashton doesn’t seem to know as much about vampires as he thinks – Calum is surprised he still believes the mirror thing even though mirrors largely stopped being silver-plated ages ago – but something about Ashton’s enthusiasm matches Calum’s in a way that he doesn’t feel with Michael. Plus, Ashton doesn’t treat Calum like he’s some little kid to keep safe from the world.

Calum had heard Luke and Michael joke once that they were going to hunt down the guy who turned them and get their revenge, but now that Ashton is very passionately taking notes on this guy, Calum is wondering if maybe the best thing he can do for Michael now is to stay away, like Luke said. No tempting human, no disasters to watch out for. Calum proposes his plan to Ashton right there without thinking twice, what if they go hunt this guy down together? Last Calum heard, he was headed west. Ashton emphatically agrees, and assures him that he has enough resources to bring Calum along.

Calum calls his office back and quits on the spot, not even leaving an option to come back if this plan falls through. He packs a bag and so does Ashton, and the next morning, they’re gone in the direction of the real vampire, and the possibility that maybe they’ve been hunting for adventure and not vampires all along.

**The end.**


	27. Chapter 27

Calum gets to work and immediately forgets every responsibility he’s ever had. He makes himself go through the motions of checking his email just in case there’s a task he’ll get in an inordinate amount of trouble for missing, and when he finds none, he pulls out his phone and texts Michael. He’s not sure what he’s worried will happen if he leaves it for too long; it’s not like Michael will forget who he is.

Michael texts back surprisingly quickly for someone who’s supposed to be working. Calum notices the hypocrisy of thinking that, but he’s sitting behind a desk where no one even looks at him for most of the day and Michael is dealing with customers. It doesn’t stop him from replying equally as quickly. It’s nearly lunch time when Calum gets the idea, probably because he’s starting to get hungry from skipping breakfast for the sake of talking to Michael. _Speaking of garlic,_ he texts – they haven’t been talking about garlic. _Do you want to go get ice cream with me tonight?_

 _What does that have to do with garlic?_ Michael asks within seconds.

_Well you don’t need to eat anyway and I’m not gonna ask you to dinner where you have to tiptoe around a menu in the name of a date_

_I’m lactose intolerant_

Calum rolls his eyes. _You just tell people that so you don’t have to explain the garlic thing, tell them you took a lactaid_

 _Hmm maybe I could…_ Calum is about to take it as a no, but Michael is still typing, until, _Pick me up at 7?_

Calum hasn’t done an ounce of work all day but he’s not about to be fired because he’s yelling at his phone in the middle of the office, so he takes off for lunch early and yells once he’s outside.

The rest of the work day is the longest afternoon of his life. He runs home to change and runs back to his car to pick up Michael and manages not to trip over his feet at any point. It’s not until after they’ve bought their ice cream and are wandering around outside shoulder to shoulder that Michael reminds him he initially asked for his number to talk about the weird guy from the coffee shop.

“Oh, yeah, him,” Calum says. He lowers his voice. “I think he’s a hunter.”

“They don’t exist anymore,” Michael says, as predicted.

“He—” Calum looks around to make sure he’s not there. “He was asking all these questions, he said something about some people being dangerous, and I got weird vibes from him.”

“Weird vibes?” Michael repeats. Calum can tell Michael isn’t taking him seriously, but he doesn’t have any other way to prove that Ashton is up to no good, so he just nods. “You’re sweet to be worried.”

“You don’t believe me.”

“Not really,” Michael says, and Calum frowns. “But I trust you. You said he was at Luke’s shop?”

Calum tries to wrap his head around Michael’s words. “Yeah, Luke was being kinda flirty.”

Michael snorts. “Of course he was.”

“If he knows where you and Luke both work, then he might know where you live. I just got a weird feeling from him. Plus he was drinking black coffee.”

“A lot of people drink black coffee.”

“Yeah, psychopaths.”

“Forget the coffee order, you think he was at the coffee shop because he knows I work there?”

“I don’t know for sure, I mean, he didn’t _say_ that, but he was hanging around Luke asking him a bunch of questions too.”

Michael makes a thoughtful face as he eats his ice cream. “I’ll ask Luke about him.”

“What about you? What if he comes back in?”

“He’s been there before, but what’s he gonna find? Even if he manages to get into the files, I’m not old enough to have to fake papers for work.”

Calum pauses, mouth open, about to take a bite of his ice cream. “How old are you?”

Michael laughs. “Twenty-five.”

“And you have been for…?”

“Less than a year.”

“Really?”

Michael nods, still grinning. “I’m kinda new at this.”

“So how are you so sure hunters don’t exist?”

“I don’t know, people at the bar always talk about them like they’re myths. I never really believed in the supernatural.” Calum knows he’s giving Michael a weird look, considering he’s a vampire saying he doesn’t believe in myths, and Michael makes the same face back at him. “If you think he’s a hunter though, I’ll take your word for it.”

“So what are you gonna do?”

“I’ll tell Luke about him, and then give everyone at the bar a heads-up and hope they don’t laugh at me.”

“No, I mean at work.” Calum is one step short of desperate to keep Michael safe, and Luke by extension.

“He won’t pull anything at the coffee shop, there are always other people around.” Michael switches his ice cream to his other hand and grabs Calum’s free hand, giving it a light squeeze. “I’ll be safe, don’t worry.”

Calum would love to not worry, but somehow the knowledge that Michael believes him only makes him worry more. For the moment though, he focuses on his ice cream and Michael’s hand in his. He manages not to ask any more overly concerned questions until they’re back at Michael’s apartment. Calum doesn’t ask before following Michael inside the building, and he hovers by the apartment door as Michael pulls out his key. He’s about to ask one more time if Michael will be okay, but Michael beats him to it.

“You still look worried Cal. He’s not gonna do anything while I’m at work.”

“What if he knows where you live?”

Michael glances at the door. “He can’t get inside without a card, which you know perfectly well.”

“And yet I manage.”

“You’re gonna make me paranoid.”

“You don’t sleep anyway.”

“But you do, so go home and try to relax.” Calum pouts, which makes Michael smile for some reason. “Thanks for the date.” Michael leans in and gives him a quick kiss. “Text me when you get home safe.”

Calum smiles as Michael goes inside, and keeps smiling until he gets home and texts Michael. Michael sends him back a smiley face and then stays quiet for the night. Against all odds, Calum does fall asleep, and the next morning he’s looking forward to work even less than he was the day before.

**To go by the coffee shop again, go to[chapter 41](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254883). To go to work on time, go to [chapter 42](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254901).**


	28. Chapter 28

“Vampires?” Calum scoffs. “You’re right, that is crazy.” He stands up hastily.

“Are you leaving?” the guy asks. Calum can tell he’s about to find a reason to keep talking to him, so he starts walking.

“Yeah, I’m gonna go try to talk to him again, you’ve, uh, inspired me.” Calum leaves him standing there looking kinda surprised as he speed-walks back to the apartment building’s door. He luckily gets there right as someone is leaving, so he doesn’t have to worry about how to get inside.

He runs up the stairs to the second floor and bangs on Michael’s and Luke’s door, not concerned with how much noise he’s making. No one will be asleep in the middle of the day to complain.

Michael pulls the door open and groans when he sees Calum, but Calum pushes past him. “You guys are in trouble.” Michael closes the door.

Luke looks up from where he’s been looking at his phone. “What?”

“There’s a hunter out there. I think he knows about you.”

“This better not be a ploy,” Luke says with a straight face.

“It’s not a ploy or a joke. I just _saw_ him outside!” Calum says. “He was here just now, and he asked me about vampires—”

“What did he ask?” Luke interrupts.

“I can’t remember exactly, but he mentioned them in a weird way and I got the feeling he was gonna try to get me to say something about you two, so I left.”

“You ran away?” Michael asks. “As if that’s not suspicious?”

“I spent the first five minutes of our conversation whining about _you_ so when I told him I was coming in to talk to you he probably believed me.” Calum looks at Luke. “I wasn’t about to leave him to come hunt you. Besides, he can’t kill me.”

“Technically it would be easier for him to kill you,” Michael says quietly.

Luke ignores him. “That’s oddly sweet,” he says.

“I’m a sweet person,” Calum replies sarcastically, but he notes that Luke sounded genuine.

“How did he find out about us?” Michael asks.

Calum shrugs. “I didn’t stay long enough to get any details. I had to warn you.”

“Sweet yet stupid,” Luke says.

“So now what?” Michael asks.

“What should I do?” Calum asks.

“Stay out of it,” Luke says. “Please. We can’t all be in danger.”

**To go back and look for Ashton, go to[chapter 39](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254847). To go home, go to [chapter 40](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254862).**


	29. Chapter 29

Ashton goes to the coffee shop where he knows Michael works more mornings than not and sets up his laptop on a table after ordering coffee from the other barista who happens to be up front while Michael is making drinks. He’s jolted to attention when someone sits in the chair across from him. He’s about to ask for his table back in a less than polite way, but he recognizes the person as Calum from yesterday. Calum, who was moping on the corner after Michael told him to go home.

“Hi,” Calum says cheerily.

“Hello?” Ashton says back. He’s a little confused, which is a fair reaction, he thinks, since Calum isn’t acting like he recognizes him.

“What are you drinking?” Calum asks, not backing down on the high energy.

“Black coffee,” Ashton replies. “Not very exciting.”

“Nice. I got a hazelnut latte. So what are you working on?”

“Research, for work.”

“You work in research? That’s cool, about what?”

Ashton stares at him for a moment. “Sorry, not that you’re not delightful company, but I really need to work.”

“This coffee shop’s a good place to work. I wish I could do my work here sometimes but unfortunately I have a boring office job.”

“Oh yeah? What do you do?” Ashton asks, deciding he might get farther by matching Calum’s energy.

“I’m a glorified secretary at a law office. I keep thinking about going back to school to be a real lawyer, but I have plenty of time to do that.”

“Wouldn’t you rather do it now? Tomorrow’s never a sure thing.”

“What’s stopping me from seeing tomorrow? Or a hundred tomorrows? Or a million?” Calum is being weird, but Ashton can’t pin down why, unless he’s trying to dig for information on Ashton the way Ashton was with him before. Or maybe it’s just a competition of who can out-weird the other. Calum’s winning at the moment.

“Guess I was always taught the world is dangerous,” Ashton says, hoping he’ll lead Calum’s conversation somewhere interesting.

“You know the chances of getting struck by lightning are very slim,” Calum informs him. “What do you mean, dangerous?”

“People aren’t always what they seem, that’s all.”

Calum leans in closer. “What are they?”

Ashton hesitates. He can’t exactly say _some people are_ _vampires_. “Just, some people are bad.”

“Oh. Well, maybe, but that’s not dangerous.”

“Sometimes things that are bad are dangerous.”

Calum nods thoughtfully and then gets up just as abruptly as he’d sat down. “I should let you get to work. Actually, I should get to work myself.” Calum stands up, taking his drink with him. Ashton gives him a confused sort of smile and watches him over the top of his laptop as he goes and says something to Michael. Michael rolls his eyes at whatever Calum says and then pulls him away from the counter. They talk for another minute before Michael kisses Calum’s nose, and then Ashton feels incredibly weird for having watched them this long. He takes a big sip of his coffee and goes back to his notes, where he tries to make sense of the conversation he just had with Calum.

It takes him an hour of flipping between his notes on vampires in general and on these two in particular before he starts to think maybe Calum is a vampire as well. Although, Calum was drinking coffee and holding a muffin, so maybe he was just a naïve human. Ashton considers that maybe Calum was covering for them, but unless he’s a vampire himself, what does he have to lose by letting them be hunted? It’s not like there aren’t plenty of humans for him to be friends with, or to date.

Ashton sends a text to one of his cousins, one who’s less likely to spread the news to the family that he’s asking stupid questions, asking if vampires can eat human food.

_Of course not??_ Ashton gets a response pretty quickly. _Thought you were supposed to be smarter than that_

That crosses Calum off the list then, but not before Ashton has wasted another hour going through all the nearby law offices sorted by distance to see if any of them have Calum listed under office staff. He doesn’t even notice Michael leave for the day, and the next thing he knows, he’s looking over at baristas he doesn’t recognize. He realizes he never got to talk to Michael, which was his whole reason to even come to the coffee shop. Best to see what he can do elsewhere, he thinks, and goes to buy a coffee for the road.

His card gets declined for the less than $3 it costs, so he figures it must be a mistake. He tries a different card and gets declined again. The barista takes pity on him and lets him have it for free, which is enough to make him wonder why he can’t pay for a coffee all of a sudden. Obviously the first thing he does is check his bank account, which has exactly $2.09 left. He texts his family asking for more money and apparently the messages to his cousin are already making the rounds because he gets asked almost immediately if he’s incompetent. He’s bombarded with texts from the family until he mutes all his group chats.

_You’re resourceful. Kill the vamp, then we’ll talk._ His mother’s message comes through separate from the rest of the family, and he realizes she’s not going to reply again. He’s still pretty unsure that Michael and Luke are vampires, and now that Calum has talked to him, he’s pretty sure that if he kills one of them, Calum and whoever is left will be on his trail immediately. He’ll have to run back home and tell his family he got chased out of town by a vampire and his human bodyguard, and then his family will never speak to him again.

Which finds him here, back at his laptop, dry on resources, and by the end of the month, out of a place to live as well. He refuses to run home with his tail tucked between his legs, and clearly the rest of his family won’t help him out, so he runs with the first idea he can think of, and he hopes it will pay off as well as he expects. Ashton decides to become an escort, and when he ends up getting inquiries within hours, he decides maybe this whole vampire thing has always been a waste of time and that he should stick to something he knows he’s good at.

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just wanted you to know that in my outline notes, this is called The Broke!SOS dead end.


	30. Chapter 30

Ashton goes home and looks over his research on these two vampires, and finds nothing of substance. He knows where they live and where they work, and that’s about it. Food preferences and intolerances do not a vampire make. Plus, one works in a coffee shop. The other is a florist. The juice bar they frequent – after all, he has been inside – is just a bar. They’re just two roommates with weird sleeping habits and that’s all. It starts as a crisis about Michael and Luke, and ends in a crisis about whether vampires are real at all, and maybe his whole childhood was just some weird, cult-like joke.

Ashton considers calling one of his family members, but he’s not sure they wouldn’t be disappointed in him. One of his uncles told him to call if he ever needed help, but Ashton is sure he meant the vampire _killing_ kind of help, not the vampire _identifying_ kind. He used to be so good at this when he was young, but what changed? Maybe his heart just isn’t in it anymore. He decides not to call anyone, and instead writes a letter to his mom. He doesn’t send it yet.

The next day, he goes out and buys a guitar like he’s always wanted to do, and he teaches himself a few chords. He also goes to the coffee shop where he knows Michael works, but Michael isn’t there. He doesn’t have the heart to convince himself Michael just happens to be working a different shift.

Within a week, he’s playing simple songs in different keys. By the second week, he’s writing his own songs, and by the end of the month he’s bought himself a proper recording microphone. No more than two weeks after that, he has an album full of introspective songs ready to be heard.

He doesn’t bother with trying to find a label, instead opting for burning CDs like it’s the 90s. He mails one to his mom along with the letter officially resigning from the family business. He drops one off with Calum’s name at the coffee shop, where the baristas working that day give him weird looks since Calum doesn’t work there, but Michael still does, so they begrudgingly agree to pass it along. If Calum ever receives it, he has no clue; as soon as it’s dropped off he packs up and moves to California. He’d included a note with the CD: “thanks for helping me find my true passion.”

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was the first dead end idea I came up with (before Superbloom came out) and the phrase "Superbloom dead end" still makes me die laughing. I guess that makes this a canon ending? Follow the drama irl.


	31. Chapter 31

Ashton walks into the coffee shop very set on not stumbling over his words if he talks to Michael up front. He tells himself he’s spoken to vampires plenty of times in trainings, and he knows what to do if it goes south, but at some point he has to admit that the nerves aren’t coming from talking to a vampire, but from talking to Michael. He may be too in his own head to admit Michael is cute, but on the chance that he isn’t, he is not past flirting.

The first thing he notices is that Michael isn’t smiling quite as brightly when he sees Ashton, and since there’s no one in line when he gets there, he has no way of knowing whether that’s because of him. He assumes it’s not, since he has no reason to think it might be, even if he’s worried about it now. He writes it off as insecurity. Waiting for his probably-too-sweet coffee though, he picks up that Michael is being weirdly less cheerful with other customers as well. One customer later, he switches with the other barista to make drinks instead, so when he calls Ashton’s name, Ashton assumes that’s the best time to talk to him. His judgment is off though, because it seems Ashton just barely beat the rush, and so Michael is quickly drowning in coffee orders and Ashton returns to his table off to the side to do work.

He keeps an eye on Michael throughout his shift and his mood doesn’t seem to get better. He doesn’t seem sad necessarily, just not as happy. Ashton goes through a set of worst-case scenarios in his head – like maybe he found out his roommate is a vampire and now he has to deal with that – but speculating isn’t getting him anywhere, so when Michael leaves at the end of his shift, Ashton doesn’t even bother being covert when he follows him out.

Michael notices him as soon as he steps outside and turns to look at him skeptically. It’s the closest to a frown Ashton has ever seen on his face. “You okay?” Ashton ventures.

“Yeah?” Michael says with a shrug. “Why?”

“You seemed less happy than usual,” Ashton says slowly. So far it’s not a lie. It’s not even a fake reason for following him out, since he is more concerned with Michael’s happiness than finding out whether he’s a vampire at this point. Anyway, vampires deserve happiness too, right?

Michael shrugs again. “In a weird mood, I don’t know, I didn’t really sleep last night.”

If Ashton was more astute, he would have made a note of that for later, but he’s not, so he just apologizes awkwardly. Then again, if Ashton was paying any amount of attention, he would have circled back to the idea that maybe Michael’s acting weird because of him.

“I’m gonna go,” Michael says after a beat of silence.

“I hope your day gets better,” Ashton says quickly before Michael can turn around.

Michael quirks his head and looks at Ashton curiously. “Thanks,” he says.

“It’s just, seeing you smile always makes me happy too, so it’s weird seeing you less… smiley.”

Michael opens his mouth like he’s about to say something and then closes it again, giving Ashton time to think about what he’s just said. He didn’t start this conversation with the intention of saying something so cheesy, or at least he’s pretty sure he didn’t. He can’t remember now, as Michael is still watching him like he’s crazy, but more amused than before.

“Why are you trying so hard to make me feel better?” Michael asks.

**To say Ashton’s just checking in, go to[chapter 44](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254994). To (attempt to) flirt, go to [chapter 43](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67254979).**


	32. Chapter 32

Ashton wakes up the next morning filled with despair at the thought of talking to Michael again and wasting more time trying to make sure he’s a vampire. He goes over the facts in his head. Luke hasn’t killed anyone, and he’s clearly well adjusted in human society, so why is Ashton supposed to kill him anyway? He refuses to admit to himself that maybe he has a bias based solely on how pretty Luke is, but even if his charm is part of him being a vampire, it seems unfair to kill someone who hasn’t done anything wrong.

He decides his family doesn’t need to know he’s decided on a whim to quit the family business, especially if all they’re going to do is berate him for the rest of his life. Instead, he looks at his collection of houseplants and decides he can do one better. He decides to move to California, where the weather is better for growing fruit trees, among other things. He packs up his plants and drives west where he can plant a proper garden, full of vegetables and fruit trees and flowers he hasn’t seen since he was a kid. It’ll be more carefree, he thinks, and he’s gone without a trace.

**The end.**


	33. Chapter 33

Ashton has the foresight this time to come up with a list of questions about his little terrarium plant – which is actually pretty cute and might deserve a name sometime soon – before heading back into the flower shop. Luckily, Luke is working the next morning too. Instead of wandering aimlessly this time, Ashton walks right up to Luke, who’s wearing a different apron this time. He waits until Luke is done helping a customer with some type of hanging plant in the window. He can’t even say he’s trying not to watch Luke’s whole face light up when the woman tells him she’s always wanted a plant in a hanger and she finally moved into a place that will let her hang things on the walls. Ashton doesn’t envy her living situation as much as the way Luke’s eyes are focused on her. If it’s a testament to how much he likes plants, then it’s cute. If it’s anything else, then… Ashton isn’t about to confront his vague jealousy about a person he barely knows right now, let alone a vampire.

Luke finishes helping the woman and sends her off with a bright smile that somehow only grows when he sees Ashton. It’s disarming, to say the least. Ashton almost forgets that he’s not just here to ask about his little plant.

**To stick to the plan, go to[chapter 46](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255060). To give up on hunting and flirt instead, go to [chapter 45](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255033).**


	34. Chapter 34

Ashton wakes up the next morning filled with despair at the thought of talking to Luke again and wasting more time trying to make sure he’s a vampire. He goes over the facts in his head. Luke hasn’t killed anyone, and he’s clearly well adjusted in human society, so why is Ashton supposed to kill him anyway? He refuses to admit to himself that maybe he has a bias based solely on how pretty Luke is, but even if his charm is part of him being a vampire, it seems unfair to kill someone who hasn’t done anything wrong.

He decides his family doesn’t need to know he’s decided on a whim to quit the family business, especially if all they’re going to do is berate him for the rest of his life. Instead, he looks at his little terrarium and decides his other plants need better homes too. He orders a potter’s wheel and a set of acrylic paints, and spends the next week covered in clay smudges and paint splatters. He makes new pots for all his houseplants, and then makes more pots, and eventually he has so many he’s not sure what to do with them.

He googles what to do with too many handmade pots and decides to sell them on etsy. He considers for a moment going back to Luke’s shop and trying to sell the plant pots there as some sort of partnership, but he can’t stand the idea of his family finding out he’s left the business to flirt with a vampire (if he even is a vampire) and he’s so desperate to get away from the shame and put it all behind him that he piles all the pots and as much else as he can fit into his car and drives out into the desert. He’s heard good things about New Mexico, artsy towns made of turquoise and gold where his handmade pottery will fit right in.

**The end.**


	35. Chapter 35

Calum walks out of the building and decides to ignore what they told him to do. He knows the car Ashton got into, and is almost not surprised when he spots it across the street. Calum gets into his own car and keeps an eye on Ashton from the parking lot, only leaving when he sees Ashton start to drive. Calum follows him at a careful distance until he realizes Ashton is going to the flower shop. From there, he backs off enough to park a block away. Ashton will recognize him if he sees him, so Calum pulls on a hoodie from his backseat despite the warmth outside, and then goes to the Starbucks opposite Luke’s shop so he can spy on Ashton.

Ashton shows up right on schedule from wherever he’s parked his car and Calum watches as he walks aimlessly around the shop, and then crawls behind the check-out counter. Calum almost yells before remembering there are two windows and a whole street between them, instead pulling his phone out to take a poor quality photo of Ashton behind the counter in case Luke doesn’t believe him. Ashton walks out only a few minutes later, after Sam, who’s working the afternoon shift, catches him behind the counter.

Calum walks outside holding his iced coffee right when he sees Ashton walking out. He overhears Ashton ask some random people about vampires, and that’s all he needs to hear. He walks as fast as he can back to his car. He wonders as he’s speed-walking why, if he knows they’re vampires and knows where they work, they would still be alive. Unless Ashton is just a really bad hunter. Or maybe he’s not sure whether or not they’re vampires and there’s still time for them to throw him off their scent.

Either way, he intends on texting Michael the picture as soon as he’s back to his car, but when he get there he sees Michael has sent him a little smiley face and it’s like Calum has never had a goal in his life. Calum sends a different emoji back, and then before he knows it it’s fifteen minutes later and he hasn’t left the parking lot, hasn’t even turned the car on, just texting Michael.

Michael, it seems, doesn’t treat Calum like he’s as annoying as he is when Luke is around. Calum can’t tell what changed all of a sudden, but he’s definitely not going to ask Michael about it. He thinks back to last week when he thought maybe Michael had drawn a little heart on top of his coffee, but Michael had snapped the lid on before he had a chance to comment on it. Calum’s starting to think he hadn’t just imagined it. _Speaking of garlic,_ he texts – they haven’t been talking about garlic. _Do you want to go get ice cream with me tonight?_

_What does that have to do with garlic?_ Michael asks within seconds.

_Well you don’t need to eat anyway and I’m not gonna ask you to dinner where you have to tiptoe around a menu in the name of a date_

_I’m lactose intolerant_

Calum rolls his eyes. _You just tell people that so you don’t have to explain the garlic thing, tell them you took a lactaid_

_Hmm maybe I could…_ Calum is about to take it as a no, but Michael is still typing, until, _Pick me up at 7?_

Calum drives home blasting music and yelling off-key, but he doesn’t care if anyone can hear him. He passes the afternoon in a mess of restlessness until he can run back to his car to pick Michael up. It’s not until after they’ve bought their ice cream and are wandering around outside shoulder to shoulder that Michael reminds him he initially asked for his number to talk about Ashton.

“Oh yeah, him,” Calum says. He pulls out his phone and shows Michael the pictures of Ashton he snapped from across the street.

“Didn’t we tell you to stay out of it?” Michael asks. He doesn’t seem upset though. “Besides, hunters don’t exist. Luke agrees.”

“But he asked these people outside the shop about vampires. You don’t think that’s weird?”

Michael narrows his eyes a little. “No, that is weird.”

“So?”

“So?” Michael repeats. “Do you have a terrible plan that I need to talk you out of? Or will you believe me if I say Luke and I will be safe?”

“You don’t know my plan is terrible,” Calum says.

Michael reaches out and touches Calum’s arm. “I don’t want you putting yourself in danger. Luke was right about Ashton being able to kill you more easily.”

“I’ll give him proof that I’m human and then lead him away from you,” Calum says. He doesn’t have a solid plan, but as he talks he feels some pieces pulling together. The more Michael protests, the more set he becomes on doing it. Michael doesn’t need to protect _him_ ; Ashton isn’t hunting humans, and Calum is perfectly capable of defending himself. Well, he’s perfectly capable of running really fast… hopefully faster than Ashton.

Calum drops Michael off outside his apartment with a kiss on the cheek and a promise that he won’t involve himself in any Ashton trouble, metaphorical fingers crossed behind his back.

The next day, Calum replies to Michael’s texts as if everything was normal, declining Michael’s invitation to hang out that evening. Calum has other plans. Instead of work, he spends the whole day tracking down Ashton. It isn’t as difficult as he expects, since he finds Ashton scoping out the outside of the blood bar even though no self-respecting vampire would go there in the daytime. Vampires have their ways of being less sensitive to the sun these days, but it’s a matter of image.

Calum manages to convince Ashton that he knows more about vampires than he let on, and it only takes a bit of storytelling and making stuff up as he goes for Ashton to agree to let Calum drive them out to the desert where he swears there’s a vampire brood. Calum mentions the town of Marfa and Ashton points out that the place is notorious for aliens, but Calum is quick enough on his feet to say that’s obviously a cover-up for vampire activity, because people are more likely to believe in aliens and not bother the residents. Ashton climbs into Calum’s car, unwitting of his fate. Calum has his boxing gloves in the back seat hidden under a blanket, and he’s ready to fight.

**The end.**


	36. Chapter 36

Calum goes home as he’s told and spends the rest of his day off worrying about Michael and Luke and Ashton who may or may not be a hunter. He worries so much he cleans his kitchen, and then his bedroom. He worries until he’s so overwhelmed with worry that the best thing he can think to do for himself is to leave town. He considers moving back home, but that doesn’t feel like the move. Instead, he goes to google and looks up the most magical towns in the country. If he can’t become a vampire, maybe he can become something else. He sees the word “witch” and his eyes catch on it for a moment before moving on.

He settles on a town near the coast that’s apparently buzzing with mermaids. It’s a long move and he has no plans for once he gets there, but he sees an ad on the town’s website listing shops that are hiring, and one of them is right next door to a magic shop, so he applies immediately and tells them he’ll be moving there in the next few days so he can start immediately. He ignores the texts he gets from Michael asking if he’s okay (what kind of dumb question is that?).

Once he gets there, feeling pretty worse for wear, the first person he sees offers himself and his friend to help him unload boxes, much to the friend’s chagrin. Nevertheless, they both help him carry the boxes into the little apartment he’d found himself the morning before he left Austin. The one who initially offered to help seems to be covered in glitter, and Calum is immediately enchanted. He’ll forget the life he left behind in no time.

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Magic AU dead end was inspired by [Em's](https://pixiegrl.tumblr.com/) [fairytale au](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26944633) if you're interested in seeing how that plays out. Em is pioneering magical Luke and I am so here for it.


	37. Chapter 37

Calum has a lot of time to consider who to tell first, seeing as he’s sitting there for at least… the longest 5 minutes of his life. He swears it’s longer, but the second someone opens the door, he dashes in, mumbling something about forgetting his keys. Enough college students live in the building that he doesn’t get a second look. He heads for the stairs, firmly decided on who’s more likely to believe him.

**To tell Michael, go to[chapter 52](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255366). To tell Luke, go to [chapter 53](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255489).**


	38. Chapter 38

Calum follows Ashton at a careful distance until he realizes Ashton is going to the flower shop. From there, he backs off enough to park a block away. Ashton will recognize him if he sees him, so Calum pulls on a hoodie from his backseat despite the warmth outside, and then goes to the Starbucks opposite Luke’s shop so he can spy on Ashton.

Ashton shows up right on schedule from wherever he’s parked his car and Calum watches as he walks aimlessly around the shop, and then crawls behind the check-out counter. Calum almost yells before remembering there are two windows and a whole street between them, instead pulling his phone out to take a poor quality photo of Ashton behind the counter in case Luke doesn’t believe him. Ashton walks out only a few minutes later, after Sam, who’s working the afternoon shift, catches him behind the counter.

Calum walks outside holding his iced coffee right when he sees Ashton walking out. He overhears Ashton ask some random people about vampires, and that’s all he needs to hear. He walks as fast as he can back to his car and guns it back to Luke’s and Michael’s apartment building. He considers as he’s driving that if he knows they’re vampires and knows where they work, then there’s no reason they’d still be alive. Unless Ashton is just a really bad hunter. Or maybe he’s not sure whether or not they’re vampires and there’s still time for them to throw him off their scent. Calum thinks he’s willing to distract Ashton if it’ll give them time to leave town or whatever they need to do to avoid him. Who’s more likely to believe him though?

**To tell Michael, go to[chapter 47](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255084). To tell Luke, go to [chapter 53](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255489).**


	39. Chapter 39

Calum walks out of the building and decides to ignore what they told him to do. He knows the car Ashton got into, and is almost not surprised when he spots it across the street. Calum gets into his own car and keeps an eye on Ashton from the parking lot, only leaving when he sees Ashton start to drive. Calum follows him at a careful distance until he realizes Ashton is going to the flower shop. From there, he backs off enough to park a block away. Ashton will recognize him if he sees him, so Calum pulls on a hoodie from his backseat despite the warmth outside, and then goes to the Starbucks opposite Luke’s shop so he can spy on Ashton.

Ashton shows up right on schedule from wherever he’s parked his car and Calum watches as he walks aimlessly around the shop, and then crawls behind the check-out counter. Calum almost yells before remembering there are two windows and a whole street between them, instead pulling his phone out to take a poor quality photo of Ashton behind the counter in case Luke doesn’t believe him. Ashton walks out only a few minutes later, after Sam, who’s working the afternoon shift, catches him behind the counter.

Calum walks outside holding his iced coffee right when he sees Ashton walking out. He overhears Ashton ask some random people about vampires, and that’s all he needs to hear. He walks as fast as he can back to his car and guns it back to Luke’s and Michael’s apartment building. He considers as he’s driving that if he knows they’re vampires and knows where they work, then there’s no reason they’d still be alive. Unless Ashton is just a really bad hunter. Or maybe he’s not sure whether or not they’re vampires and there’s still time for them to throw him off their scent. Calum thinks he’s willing to distract Ashton if it’ll give them time to leave town or whatever they need to do to avoid him.

He’s sitting outside the apartment building for the second time that day, waiting for someone to open the door for him, when he stops to wonder what he’s doing. Luke isn’t really giving him the time of day, especially with Michael being so overprotective. He’s been told multiple times that they’ll be safe, and it’s clear to Calum that neither of them really want him around. He gets up and walks back to his car, dwelling on the thought that maybe his parents were right to discourage him from wanting to be a vampire.

By the time he’s back at his apartment, he’s decided to move back home. He calls them to let them know. They don’t ask him if he’s given up on becoming a vampire, and he doesn’t tell them; they’ll find out on their own once he’s there and he starts eating garlic again.

Calum decides if he’s not spending all his time chasing vampires, it’s time for him to finally get a dog. He drags his dad to a shelter with him and falls in love with a tiny, fluffy little creature who happens to be named Luke. Calum considers not changing the dog’s name so he’s not confused, but instead he changes it to a name that sounds similar enough: Duke. He doesn’t need a reminder of the love he lost back in Austin.

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Not Human Luke dead end was inspired by [Bella's](https://clumsyclifford.tumblr.com/) [Human Luke fic,](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26789659) which is the opposite of how this ended, but was the inspiration nonetheless. Love you bella x2 *kissing heart emoji*


	40. Chapter 40

Calum decides to go home, with no discernable reason to stick around to try and get Luke to talk to him more. He’s learned it’s best to let Luke do the talking until he’s ready to hear what Calum has to say, which won’t be anytime soon now that Michael is annoyed with him. He reasons on his way home that he’ll go by the flower shop the next morning on his way to work, to talk to Luke and maybe apologize for bothering him, and hopefully soften him up a little because, vampire or not, he is starting to get attached to Luke as a person. No one else could get away with making so many plant jokes and get away with it.

Calum walks into the flower shop as planned bright and early the next morning, and Luke isn’t busy with anything yet, so he walks right up to the counter. It only takes one carefully phrased question about the season’s best blooms to launch Luke into an impassioned explanation about how the rainfall last year made it so that a lot more sunflowers are blooming this year than usual, which is nice for some list of reasons. Calum doesn’t care about the specifics, but Luke’s rambling is endearing, and Calum thinks he could ask a hundred more questions to see his face light up like this forever.

Luke stops eventually, and looks at Calum. “You didn’t hear anything I said, did you?” he asks with a short laugh. “Should have known you were just trying to get me to talk to you.”

“Were we not on speaking terms?” Calum asks.

“I guess we were. So what is it today, hmm? No work?”

“No, I have work,” Calum says. “I just wanted to say hi, brighten my day a little before sitting in an office for hours and hours.”

“Well, aren’t you sweet.” Luke smiles and plucks one of the aforementioned sunflowers from the display bucket on the wall, handing it to Calum.

“And still not as sunny as you,” Calum says. He thinks he’s lost control of his words at this point, saying whatever it takes to keep Luke smiling.

It works. Luke giggles and goes back to the counter. “You’re certainly in a mood this morning.”

“I guess I wanted to make sure you were still okay.”

Luke leans his elbows on the counter and looks at Calum with his head on his hands. “I’m okay. I mean, no one’s here yet, obviously, but I’m not worried.”

“If he shows up?”

“I won’t follow him out into any dark alleys, I promise. He won’t do anything in broad daylight. Sweet of you to worry though.”

“Should I come back at lunch to check on you?”

“You work all the way downtown, Cal.” Calum is about to argue that it’s worth it, but he sees Luke scribble something on the back of a business card that he then hands to Calum. “Save some time and text me if you’re worried. I’ll let you know if he comes back in.”

**To text Luke about Ashton, go to[chapter 48](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255111). To flirt, go to [chapter 49](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255135).**


	41. Chapter 41

Calum wakes up to a good morning text from Michael and his mind is made up. He’s not going to lose anything being late to work two days in a row. He makes the slightest attempt to be earlier than he was yesterday, but that only means he’ll spend more time talking to Michael.

Michael clearly expected him to show up, because he has a drink and a chocolate chip muffin waiting for Calum when he gets there. “Didn’t get enough last night?” Michael asks.

“If I say no can we go out again tonight?” Calum says.

Michael laughs and Calum forgets for a moment that he came in with the intention of looking for Ashton. Michael watches him do a scan of the room and sighs, pulling him aside past the back counter. “He’s not here, and even if he was, I can take care of myself.” When Calum doesn’t look convinced, Michael cups Calum’s face in his hand. “When did you go from wanting me to bite you to wanting to protect me?”

Calum widens his eyes when Michael says the word “bite” and hopes anyone who overhears thinks they’re talking about something else. He doesn’t have an answer for Michael anyway. It’s not like he woke up one day and decided that this vampire he’d gotten into the habit of following around and begging to turn him was actually kinda cute, and not as intimidating as he thought.

“I’ll be fine,” Michael says quietly, interrupting Calum’s thoughts. He leans forward and kisses Calum’s nose. “Now go before you’re late for work.”

Work is boring, as predicted. Calum is beyond antsy by the end of the day, but Michael has sent him a text asking if he wants to come by after work, so at least he has something to look forward to.

When he arrives at Michael’s building, he’s relieved to be able to text asking to be buzzed in instead of having to sit around and wait for someone to leave. Michael greets him with a smile that’s decidedly different from his customer service face, soft enough to send a rush of butterflies to his stomach. “How was work?” Michael asks. Calum gives him a look and Michael laughs. “That dull?”

“Oh no, answering the phone two dozen times was riveting.”

“Come in, have a seat, do you want something to eat or drink?”

“You guys have food?”

“This bitch never stops snacking,” Luke says from the couch. “You would think we save tons on food, but he eats so many oreos.”

“Shut up, you used to eat endless hot cheetos until you almost died that one time,” Michael says.

Calum wanders into the room and takes a seat at the opposite end of the couch. “What happened?”

“I didn’t know they had garlic powder in them until after I got turned,” Luke says dejectedly.

Michael grins. “Yeah, took him a trip to the hospital for them to tell him he’s probably allergic to something in them.”

“But you don’t _have_ to eat,” Calum says.

“No,” Michael says, dropping onto the couch between Calum and Luke. “But old habits, you know? Plus, oreos are so good. Worth developing a sweet tooth for. Wanna watch a movie?”

“If you two are gonna be gross, I’m leaving now.” Luke hands the remote over to Michael.

“Wait,” Michael says. “Tell him what you know about Ashton.” Calum looks at Luke.

“Not much, he came back into the shop this morning asking questions about his terrarium and how much water the plant needed, and I told him it’s a succulent so really not a lot but it does need good light, and probably fertilizer—”

“Luke,” Michael snaps.

“I gave him a pamphlet that explains it all, and then when he left I looked up his name in the system from when he paid yesterday, but he doesn’t have a phone number connected with the card so all we know is his name.” Luke looks right at Calum. “I’m with Michael on this, I don’t think he’s a hunter.”

“If he shows up again, you might start to be suspicious,” Michael says to Luke.

“Or maybe he just likes me,” Luke retorts.

“Oh, so he’s a hunter _and_ he has bad taste,” Michael says.

Luke scowls and gets up.

“You’re really not worried?” Calum asks before Luke can leave.

“He seems nice, and not like he wants to put a stake through my heart.”

“He’s lovesick,” Michael says, pointing to Luke, and Luke gives him a middle finger before going off to his room or wherever he can be away from them.

Calum falls asleep an undetermined time into the movie and wakes up with his head on Michael’s shoulder, to Michael absentmindedly playing with the hair at the base of his neck. The movie is still playing, though Calum recognizes it as a scene near the end, so he can’t have been asleep that long. He considers sitting up, but Michael is comfortable. Instead, he cuddles in closer.

Michael’s shoulders move a little when he laughs lightly. “I’m glad you enjoyed the movie.”

“Can’t help it that you’re comfy. And surprisingly warm for a vampire.”

“Yeah, and you just fall asleep in front of a vampire and expect that I won’t bite you in your sleep?”

Calum knows he’s joking, but something about the trust in it makes him feel something between touched and embarrassed. “No, because you know I’d like that and you’re a tease.”

“I literally invited you over, how am I a tease?” Michael chuckles when Calum shrugs. “I ordered you dinner by the way. Pizza, so I can’t share, but we don’t have any real food and I assume you won’t want to fill up on oreos and sour patch kids.”

Calum sits up at that and looks at Michael. “That’s really thoughtful.”

Michael frowns a little. “Why do you seem surprised?”

“I thought you just thought I was annoying.”

“You are,” Michael says, smiling. “You’re also sweet and caring and a human who needs to eat.”

“Is this a second date?”

“I bought you dinner, didn’t I?”

Calum and Michael are still smiling at each other when Luke yells Michael’s name as he walks into the room. “You gave the pizza guy my number instead of yours?”

“Calum was asleep on me, I didn’t want to wake him up to go get the pizza.”

“Well he’s awake now, but I’m guessing you’re still gonna make me go get it?”

“Thank you,” Michael says sweetly. Luke grabs his keys and strops out.

The moment Michael turns back to him, Calum leans forward to kiss him. Calum doesn’t hear Luke come back in, and apparently neither does Michael, because they both jump when Luke drops the pizza box loudly on the table. Luke makes a disgusted noise and goes back to his room.

Michael insists Calum dig into the pizza, and Calum starts out worried that it’ll be awkward if Michael’s having half a conversation, but Michael seems to have no issue with it. He’s telling stories about weird customers at work, starting with the “legendary large espresso lady” who ordered a large coffee with only 16 shots of espresso, and then going into tangents about how he’s glad he doesn’t like coffee because he doesn’t have to deal with a caffeine crash since he can’t even sleep it off. Calum was already pretty charmed by him, but after a while of watching him talk with his hands and laugh at his own stories, he’s fully enamored. Eventually, Michael puts on another movie and the last couple slices of Calum’s pizza are abandoned in favor of cuddling back up to Michael’s side, this time set on staying awake. He gets half an hour in before he yawns, and after the third yawn, Michael pauses the movie.

“You know you don’t have to stay if you’re tired,” Michael says. He makes no attempt to pull his arm back from around Calum’s shoulders.

**To stay the night, go to[chapter 50](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255210). To go home because tomorrow is another work day, go to [chapter 51](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255231).**


	42. Chapter 42

Work is boring, as predicted. Calum is beyond antsy by the end of the day, but Michael has sent him a text asking if he wants to come by after work, so at least he has something to look forward to.

When he arrives at Michael’s building, he’s relieved to be able to text asking to be buzzed in instead of having to sit around and wait for someone to leave. Michael greets him with a smile that’s decidedly different from his customer service face, soft enough to send a rush of butterflies to his stomach. “How was work?” Michael asks. Calum gives him a look and Michael laughs. “That dull?”

“Oh no, answering the phone two dozen times was riveting.”

“Come in, have a seat, do you want something to eat or drink?”

“You guys have food?”

“This bitch never stops snacking,” Luke says from the couch. “You would think we save tons on food, but he eats so many oreos.”

“Shut up, you used to eat endless hot cheetos until you almost died that one time,” Michael says.

Calum wanders into the room and takes a seat at the opposite end of the couch. “What happened?”

“I didn’t know they had garlic powder in them until after I got turned,” Luke says dejectedly.

Michael grins. “Yeah, took him a trip to the hospital for them to tell him he’s probably allergic to something in them.”

“But you don’t _have_ to eat,” Calum says.

“No,” Michael says, dropping onto the couch between Calum and Luke. “But old habits, you know? Plus, oreos are so good. Worth developing a sweet tooth for. Wanna watch a movie?”

“If you two are gonna be gross, I’m leaving now.” Luke hands the remote over to Michael.

“Wait,” Michael says. “Tell him what you know about Ashton.” Calum looks at Luke.

“Not much, he came back into the shop this morning asking questions about his terrarium and how much water the plant needed, and I told him it’s a succulent so really not a lot but it does need light, and probably fertilizer—”

“Luke,” Michael snaps.

“I gave him a pamphlet that explains it all, and then when he left I looked up his name in the system from when he paid yesterday, but he doesn’t have a phone number connected with the card so all we know is his name.” Luke looks right at Calum. “I’m with Michael on this, I don’t think he’s a hunter.”

“If he shows up again, you might start to be suspicious,” Michael says to Luke.

“Or maybe he just likes me,” Luke retorts.

“Oh, so he’s a hunter _and_ he has bad taste,” Michael says.

Luke scowls and gets up.

“You’re really not worried?” Calum asks before Luke can leave.

“He seems nice, and not like he wants to put a stake through my heart.”

“He’s lovesick,” Michael says, pointing to Luke, and Luke gives him a middle finger before going off to his room or wherever he can be away from them.

Calum falls asleep an undetermined time into the movie and wakes up with his head on Michael’s shoulder, to Michael absentmindedly playing with the hair at the base of his neck. The movie is still playing, though Calum recognizes it as a scene near the end, so he can’t have been asleep that long. He considers sitting up, but Michael is comfortable. Instead, he cuddles in closer.

Michael’s shoulders move a little when he laughs lightly. “I’m glad you enjoyed the movie.”

“Can’t help it that you’re comfy. And surprisingly warm for a vampire.”

“Yeah, and you just fall asleep in front of a vampire and expect that I won’t bite you in your sleep?”

Calum knows he’s joking, but something about the trust in it makes him feel something between touched and embarrassed. “No, because you know I’d like that and you’re a tease.”

“I literally invited you over, how am I a tease?” Michael chuckles when Calum shrugs. “I ordered you dinner by the way. Pizza, so I can’t share, but we don’t have any real food and I assume you won’t want to fill up on oreos and sour patch kids.”

Calum sits up at that and looks at Michael. “That’s really thoughtful.”

Michael frowns a little. “Why do you seem surprised?”

“I thought you just thought I was annoying.”

“You are,” Michael says, smiling. “You’re also sweet and caring and a human who needs to eat.”

“Is this a second date?”

“I bought you dinner, didn’t I?”

Calum and Michael are still smiling at each other when Luke yells Michael’s name as he walks into the room. “You gave the pizza guy my number instead of yours?”

“Calum was asleep on me, I didn’t want to wake him up to go get the pizza.”

“Well he’s awake now, but I’m guessing you’re still gonna make me go get it?”

“Thank you,” Michael says sweetly. Luke grabs his keys and strops out.

The moment Michael turns back to him, Calum leans forward to kiss him. Calum doesn’t hear Luke come back in, and apparently neither does Michael, because they both jump when Luke drops the pizza box loudly on the table. Luke makes a disgusted noise and goes back to his room.

Michael insists Calum dig into the pizza, and Calum starts out worried that it’ll be awkward if Michael’s having half a conversation, but Michael seems to have no issue with it. He’s telling stories about weird customers at work, starting with the “legendary large espresso lady” who ordered a large coffee with only 16 shots of espresso, and then going into tangents about how he’s glad he doesn’t like coffee because he doesn’t have to deal with a caffeine crash since he can’t even sleep it off. Calum was already pretty charmed by him, but after a while of watching him talk with his hands and laugh at his own stories, he’s fully enamored. Eventually, Michael puts on another movie and the last couple slices of Calum’s pizza are abandoned in favor of cuddling back up to Michael’s side, this time set on staying awake. He gets half an hour in before he yawns, and after the third yawn, Michael pauses the movie.

“You know you don’t have to stay if you’re tired,” Michael says. He makes no attempt to pull his arm back from around Calum’s shoulders.

**To stay the night, go to[chapter 50](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255210). To go home because tomorrow is another work day, go to [chapter 51](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255231).**


	43. Chapter 43

“Because you’re cuter when you’re happy. Uh, not that you’re not still cute, but, you know what? You’re right. I should leave you alone.” Ashton feels like he’s sufficiently made a fool of himself, and Michael doesn’t say anything to stop him, so he turns and walks back toward the door.

“I never said you had to leave,” Michael says. Ashton turns around warily. “You didn’t answer my question, but I guess I can assume you’re just a good person who likes to see other humans smile?”

Ashton’s ears catch on Michael’s word choice, but there’s no way he would know Ashton is a hunter, unless Calum figured it out somehow, and Ashton knows for a fact that Calum is a human. “Yeah. And I thought maybe I could take you out tonight and get you happy again?” Ashton does not have a plan. The plan he had before following Michael out definitely did not include a date with a vampire. That is, if Michael says yes.

“Do you make a habit of hitting on your baristas?” Michael asks.

“Uhh,” Ashton stammers.

“Where would we go on this date?” Michael crosses his arms and looks at Ashton questioningly. Michael blinks at him and Ashton gets the feeling he’s being made fun of, but at least Michael isn’t running away. Ashton waits too long to say something. “I’ll meet you back here at 5, you better have a plan by then.”

Ashton does not have a _plan_ per se, but he drove past a fun fair in a strip mall parking lot on the way home, so now it’s 5 pm and he’s waiting in the coffee shop parking lot for Michael. He’s starting to wonder if he should be in front of the building instead, but then Michael walks out the back door, grinning expectantly as soon as he sees Ashton. “So do you have a plan?” Michael asks.

Ashton does have a vague plan. He can’t exactly take Michael out for dinner if he’s going to tell Michael he’s not planning on hunting him, especially since he gets the feeling Michael somehow knows about his job. That hunch could be a result of overthinking for a few hours earlier, but even if Michael doesn’t know and Ashton ends up taking him by surprise, he wants to be very clear in his intentions.

He drives them to the fun fair and keeps one eye on Michael’s expression as they approach the parking lot just to make sure he hasn’t misjudged it as something Michael would enjoy. Luckily, Michael looks pleasantly surprised. “I didn’t want to be a cliché and take a barista out for coffee,” Ashton jokes.

“To be honest, I don’t really like coffee,” Michael says as Ashton parks the car. _No surprise._ “I’m more of a tea guy.” _Okay, some surprise._

Ashton buys a bunch of game tickets and finds himself running behind Michael, who claims to be incredible at every game because he has great hand-eye coordination from playing a lot of video games. Ashton doesn’t question it. Before long, Michael has won a pair of comically large light-up sunglasses, which he has bestowed upon Ashton, a neon green balloon hat, which he’s wearing, and a sizable teddy bear which he insists on carrying around himself. Ashton asked him to go on one roller coaster but they find out Michael only like spinning rides and Ashton only likes the ones with drops, so they finally settle on the ferris wheel. Michael sits the teddy bear between them on the swing and up they go.

If Michael knows Ashton is trained to kill him, he should be trying harder to stay out of situations where it’s just the two of them, right? Not that it would be particularly easy to get away with killing him on an open-air ride, but Michael doesn’t seem the least bit nervous. He actually looks like he’s having fun. “Can we get funnel cakes after this?” Michael asks, shaking Ashton out of his thoughts.

“Sure,” Ashton says, and Michael smiles at him over the teddy bear between them that’s starting to feel a little intrusive. The sun is starting to set as they slow to a stop at the top of the ride, and if Ashton wasn’t so anxious about admitting his job to Michael, he would be trying a lot harder to sneak in some sort of romcom tropey kiss.

“Hey look, you can see downtown from up here!” Michael is pointing off to the right. Ashton follows his finger to the horizon where the miniature buildings are peeking up against the golden sky.

“Are you having a good time?” Ashton asks. “I didn’t know what you’d like.”

“Gotta be honest, I didn’t think I’d be having this much fun, but yeah.” It makes Ashton even more worried about telling Michael about being a hunter, especially now that Michael is actually letting his guard down. If anything, Michael trusts him already, which means there’s no way he knows. “Why do you look so nervous? Scared of heights?”

“Do I?”

“I mean, you’re holding Teddy’s hand like you’re about to die or something.”

“Teddy?” Michael gestures to the stuffed bear and, sure enough, Ashton has a death grip on its hand. “Oh.” He lets go and puts his hands in his lap.

“You can hold his hand if you want. I won’t get jealous.” Michael is still grinning, and Ashton considers taking the chance to hold Michael’s hand instead, but if Michael ends up hating him in a few minutes, he figures it’s best to cut his losses.

The ride eventually circles them back down and they get out. Ashton mentions going through the fun house before getting funnel cakes. They wander through rooms of balloons all over the walls and fuzzy worms-on-strings hanging from the ceiling before reaching the mirror room. Michael walks in first without hesitation and Ashton takes a deep breath and follows him in.

He almost walks directly into a mirror that is deceptively close to him, and freezes when he sees Michael’s reflection. Michael stops when he notices Ashton isn’t moving and turns around. “Are you okay?”

 _Is_ he okay? He can see Michael’s reflection, the same Michael who drinks tea and eats funnel cakes, and who works in a coffee shop. He feels like the room is spinning for half a second before staring at Michael with his mouth open.

Michael tilts his head, looking increasingly concerned. He drops the teddy bear against one of the mirrors and takes two steps up to Ashton, steadying him by the arms. “Do you wanna maybe sit for a minute?” Michael doesn’t wait for a response – not that Ashton could speak even if he wanted to – before gently pulling him down to the ground. “Are you okay?” Michael repeats. He still has his hands on Ashton’s forearms, sitting cross legged in front of him. It’s weirdly grounding to know that even if Ashton is wrong about him being a vampire, at least he’s not a total hallucination.

“I think so?” Ashton says slowly.

“What happened? Got lightheaded?”

“Something like that.” Ashton turns a little to look at the tens of reflections of Michael he can see just from where he’s sitting. “I think I jumped to conclusions.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think I was wrong about you.”

Michael bites his bottom lip like he’s trying not to smile. “Not totally wrong.”

Ashton leans forward a little. “What?”

“I think you still owe me a funnel cake before I give you an explanation.”

It’s dark outside by the time Michael manages to get Ashton to his feet. He walks them out of the fun house, where he sits himself and Teddy on a bench and announces that he likes strawberry syrup. Ashton buys two funnel cakes and hands the strawberry topped one to Michael before sitting down beside him. He has no idea where to begin, so he takes a bite of a twisty piece of funnel cake.

“You know vampires not having reflections is a myth, right?” Michael says lightly, as if it’s not a truth that undermines the integrity of the foundation of everything he was taught. Ashton just nods. “And you know I know about you?” Ashton nods again. “And I followed you into a house full of dark rooms voluntarily, despite knowing about you?” Ashton wonders where he’s going with these questions, but Michael doesn’t ask anything more. He tears off a piece of his funnel cake and pops it in his mouth.

“You weren’t scared of me?”

Michael scoffs. “You’ve been more nervous than me all night. And it’s not like I couldn’t get away if I needed to. Or bite back.”

Ashton glances around. No one else is seeming to pick up on Michael’s choice of words, which must be deliberate. “You can also eat carnival food, so what else was I wrong about?”

“A lot, probably.” All the strawberry syrup is starting to leave a red stain on Michael’s lips that looks suspiciously like blood. It’s strangely not terrifying.

Once they’re back in the car, after Michael insisted on buckling Teddy into the back seat, Ashton feels like they’re far enough away from wandering ears to ask the only thing left on his mind. “If you knew I was a hunter, why did you agree to go out with me?”

Michael sighs. “To get an idea of how dangerous you were. I can’t tell how much of it is bad training, but your family’s notoriety does not measure up.”

“Yeah, I think the stuff I learned might be a little old-fashioned.”

“It might have worked on an older vampire, to be fair. I’ve heard the older you get, the more you grow out of stuff like eating human food.”

“So how dangerous do you think I am?”

Michael raises his eyebrows. “No offense, but not very. I mean, why would you take me into a house of mirrors if you wanted to kill me?”

“I didn’t want to kill you, I just wanted to tell you I was a hunter and I thought I wouldn’t be able to see you so you’d have the advantage to escape if you wanted.” Ashton pauses to try and figure out Michael’s expression, but he’s still not thinking very clearly. “For the record, I think I’m gonna quit being a hunter. But I guess this means there won’t be a second date.”

“You bought me carnival food and humored me carrying around a giant teddy bear half the night. I think there could be a second date.”

Ashton accidentally drives Michael back to his apartment instead of the coffee shop, and Michael stares at him until it registers to him that they’d left from the coffee shop, so all driving him home did was prove that Ashton already knew where he lived. Michael doesn’t seem put off by it. Ashton reaches back to unbuckle Teddy’s seatbelt but Michael stops him and insists Ashton keep him for the night. “Joint custody,” he says. He pushes the door open before leaning back in to press a quick, strawberry kiss to Ashton’s lips, and then he’s gone.

Ashton gets home as if on autopilot and carries Teddy in with him. He considers adding the events of the night to his work log, but he’s quitting anyway, so he decides to just journal it instead. He’s obviously going back to the coffee shop the next morning, even if that’s the only thing he’s sure of in that moment.

The coffee shop is full to the brim when Ashton shows up the next morning. He hadn’t meant to sleep in, but after writing it all out in his journal, he really didn’t see a reason to not quit right then. His family would probably be asleep anyway; they were all on the east coast. He sent his mother a resignation email in the most professional way he could manage, and decided against letting her know that nearly everything she taught him about vampires was a lie. After all, what kind of maybe-boyfriend of a vampire would he be if he revealed all their secrets? All of that took longer than he expected, and now here he is in a long line of people at the peak of morning busyness.

Michael catches his eye when he reaches the front and orders a black coffee from the other barista. “Realized you forgot something?” Michael asks him after he’s paid.

“Was I supposed to bring Teddy back?” Ashton asks. It only crossed his mind after he’d left, but to be fair, he wasn’t sure he wanted to be the weirdo who brought someone a giant teddy bear at work.

Michael giggles. “No, idiot, give me your phone.”

“Aren’t you busy?”

“Not if you’re fast about it.” Michael holds out his hand for Ashton’s phone, and Ashton watches him add his number to his contacts and then send himself a text.

Ashton quickly realizes he has no way to spend time now that he’s not wasting it on research, but that mostly leaves him more time to do what he lied about doing before and actually writing. No one outside his family would believe him if he started to write a memoir about his life as a vampire hunter, and anyone who did would probably be a vampire. He doesn’t decide to memorialize it in fiction as much as he sits down to write and that’s what ends up coming out.

Michael texts him around the end of his shift asking if Ashton wants to go get dinner, and Ashton has to remind himself that Michael does eat human food. He’ll have to ask if it’s something he does because he has to eat to survive or just because he wants to. The next week passes mostly in the same way, with writing in the morning and then finding any excuse to spend more time with Michael. The next Saturday, Michael says it’s probably time for Teddy to switch houses, so Ashton takes him over as soon as Michael lets him know he’s home.

Someone is leaving when he gets to the front door of the building, so he doesn’t stop to tell Michael he’s there. He barely notices the strange look the other person gives him. Ashton knocks on Michael’s door and hears someone shout something before the door opens to Luke, who takes one look at Teddy and bursts out laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Calum asks from the couch behind Luke.

Michael hadn’t said everyone else would be there too. Ashton starts to wish Teddy was big enough for him to disappear behind, but at least Luke doesn’t look upset with him.

Calum grabs Luke’s arm and whispers something in his ear. Luke twists his arm together with Calum’s and whispers something back, so apparently they worked out whatever relationship problems they were having, vampire related or not.

“Don’t just leave him out in the hall,” Michael calls, walking in from another room. He shows up near the door and pulls Ashton in by the wrist, taking Teddy and sitting him on a chair. “Sorry about them.” He weaves his fingers together with Ashton’s and squeezes his hand.

“You never mentioned he was the type to buy you teddy bears, Mike.” Luke is still laughing from the couch, where he’s seated beside a still-confused Calum.

“I won the bear myself, thank you,” Michael says to Luke.

“So you’re not going to introduce us to your new boyfriend?”

“What happened to him being a hunter?” Calum asks loudly.

Michael turns back to Ashton, giving him a chance to answer. “He quit?” Ashton says.

“He- you quit? Why?”

Ashton looks at Michael. He doesn’t know what he’s meant to say. He’d told his mother his heart wasn’t in it anymore, but it’s a little early to bring his heart into this with Michael, at least in front of his friends.

“Gross,” Luke says.

“You knew about this?” Calum asks Luke, sounding bewildered.

“Can you leave already?” Michael asks. Luke grumbles and tugs Calum out the door.

“You didn’t tell them about me?” Ashton asks as soon as they’re gone.

“I told Luke, just not Calum because he was on some mission to take you down all on his own.” Michael shakes his head. “We decided Luke should keep him distracted so he didn’t end up putting himself in danger out of whatever misguided protectiveness. He’s on a kick about wanting to become a vampire.”

“They look like they hit it off.”

“That wasn’t part of the plan. Then again,” Michael says, letting to of Ashton’s hands to wrap his arms around his neck instead. “Neither was this.”

Ashton loses any other doubts he had when Michael kisses him, forgetting everything other than how to stay standing. His hands find Michael’s waist and he doesn’t know how long they spend like that but it might as well be forever. There’s nowhere else he’d rather be.

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Congratulations! You've reached one of the ending-endings!


	44. Chapter 44

“Because you always seem really happy and you looked down so I wanted to check in.”

Michael looks rightfully confused. “That’s nice of you, I think? But I’ll be fine once I get home and relax.”

“Okay, yeah,” Ashton says, mostly to himself, as Michael walks to his car.

Ashton can’t think of another reason to stop Michael, and so he watches Michael drive away before going back inside to get his things and go home himself. Before closing his laptop – which he wonders why he didn’t do before following Michael out – he glances over his useless notes. There’s nothing there that he couldn’t have figured out on his first day on the job if he’d tried harder.

The more he thinks about it, the more he thinks he’s fully embarrassed himself in front of Michael. It’s a little ridiculous, but he can’t think about anything else. He’s catastrophizing as much as he possibly can, and he’s aware of it, but he can’t seem to stop. He wouldn’t even know Michael if it wasn’t for his job, and that’s the thought that leads him to think maybe his job is the problem here. Maybe his job is the only thing standing between him and finally being able to relax.

One google search tells him the closest place in the country where coffee grows is California, so he starts looking into places to move there. Within the week, he’s found not only a place to rent where he can grow his own coffee beans, but a coffee bean collective he can join that sells custom blends at local farmer’s markets. Only a few days later, he’s all packed up to drive out west and leave his Michael-related embarrassment behind him, vampire hunting and all.

**The end.**


	45. Chapter 45

Ashton approaches the counter and Luke smiles at him expectantly for a moment before he remembers he’s here for a reason. He fumbles with pulling his phone out, but before he can unlock it, Luke lets out a small laugh. When Ashton looks back up, Luke is still smiling at him. Ashton glances over his shoulder and, well, at least he’s not holding up any other customers.

“Did you need help with something?” Luke asks, raising his eyebrows.

Ashton thinks for a moment he’d be more capable of forming a sentence if Luke wasn’t so tall. “What should I name my plant?” he asks. That was definitely not on the list he’d come up with last night.

Luke giggles. “Naming a plant is a very personal thing, I don’t like naming people’s plants for them.” Ashton keeps staring, so Luke continues. “For example, I got my roommate a cactus a while ago.” He holds his hands up a few inches off the counter, presumably showing him the size of the cactus. “Knowing him, I thought he’d go for something like Spike. But I asked him the next day and he said the cactus is named Bear. I asked him why, and you know what he said?” Ashton shrugs. “Because it’s prickly. Like a prickly pear, but a prickly Bear. I tried to tell him it’s not a prickly pear cactus, it’s a Mammillaria, not that that means anything to him. So, you know, follow your heart.”

If there’s anything left to say, Ashton doesn’t have the words. What comes out is, “So I can name my plant Luke?” If he’d spent any time thinking of what to say, he would have chosen something else, but then Luke is blushing and laughing and Ashton has all but decided that he can’t kill Luke even if he happens to be the world’s most horrific vampire. Which might make him the world’s most horrific hunter.

“You can name it Luke if you want,” Luke says, pushing his hair back behind his ear. “What do you do that gives you so much time to go plant shopping?” He leans forward on the counter and props his chin up on his hand.

“I’m a freelancer,” Ashton says. Luckily it’s a lie he’s practiced too many times to forget, even in the face of a very cute vampire.

“Oh, are you an artist?”

“Writer.”

“Too bad. You have artist hands.”

Ashton looks down at his hands. “I used to paint,” he says hesitantly. “In school.”

Luke nods like he’s satisfied with Ashton’s answer. “You came all the way back here to ask if you can name your plant after me?”

Ashton can’t remember why he came back anymore. “Yeah, I guess I did.”

Luke pulls a business card out of the little holder on the counter and scribbles something on the back before handing it to Ashton. “Maybe next time you can save a trip?” Ashton takes the card and sees a phone number. “Or you could keep coming back.”

Ashton has no real destination when he leaves the flower shop, and unfortunately it’s not until he’s back at his car that he remembers his list of questions. It’s not like the questions were pressing or important anyway. He looks back down at his hands and wonders the whole way home if Luke’s comment was meant to be a compliment.

 _This is Ashton_ , he texts. _From the shop_ , he adds after a minute goes by and Luke hasn’t replied.

Luke’s response doesn’t come for a couple hours, and by then Ashton has almost convinced himself to forget the whole thing and move to Nevada. There’s no protocol for getting a vampire’s number anyway. Nowhere in his training did anyone tell him what to do if he found himself in pursuit of an _attractive_ vampire. Of course he wasn’t taught that vampires look like they did in Buffy but if they’re going to look like average people, they’re supposed to look like… average people. In no way is Luke average.

_Hey!! Sorry I don’t usually keep my phone on me at work_

Ashton is about to respond with some variation of “no problem” but Luke beats him to it.

_Anyway, how was the rest of your morning? Good I hope?_

He vaguely wonders if Luke is asking him so many questions because he couldn’t seem to speak that morning. _Pretty good_ , he replies.

_And how’s terrarium Luke?_

Ashton smiles as he snaps a picture of the terrarium at the center of his coffee table and sends it off. _He’s pretty good too, he’s just hanging out_

 _He looks like good company_ , Luke says.

Ashton takes the opportunity. _He’s nice but I think I’d prefer human company_

 _Can’t agree_ , Luke says, along with a picture of a bookshelf with a different plant on each shelf, and not many books. _But if that’s an invitation I might say yes_

He may be keen but he thinks maybe inviting a vampire to his apartment alone isn’t a great idea, especially when being around Luke puts him in a state where he can barely talk, let alone defend himself. It’s not something he thinks about often, the fact that he hasn’t really dated anyone as an adult because of his job and his family, but now as he’s considering what he could possibly say to Luke that isn’t either too forward or too casual for a first date. Coffee seems like the way to go, but if his roommate works at a coffee shop— Ashton shakes himself out of that train of thought. Why is he treating this as if he knows for sure Luke is a vampire? That had been his whole problem only yesterday, and now he’s taking Luke’s possible dietary habits into consideration when trying to ask him out? His logic has stopped making sense.

 _It is an invitation_ , Ashton sends back. _Dinner?_

Dinner comes along and Ashton is unspeakably nervous for an adult who’s going on a date. He tries to blame it on the fact that said date is with a vampire, but he knows he’s only lying to himself. Luke arrives right on time with an expectably sunny smile and opts for a salad instead of an entrée.

“You’re a plant person through and through,” Ashton teases.

Luke chuckles. “Not all the time.”

Ashton tries not to be surprised when Luke actually takes a bite of his food. He’d been expecting Luke to push his food around his plate and pretend to eat. They’re having an easy conversation for about ten minutes and Luke is casually eating fries off Ashton’s plate, then Luke gets a strange look on his face. Ashton is about to ask if he’s okay when he excuses himself to the bathroom. Ashton doesn’t think about it for more than a moment before following after him.

He sees Luke pull his phone out as he pushes the door open into the bathroom, and as Ashton gets closer to the door, hears him talking to someone. “I’m at dinner, Mike. What do you _think_ happened?”

 _What_ did _happen?_ Ashton thinks to himself as he hovers outside the door. He hopes no one walks by and thinks he’s being creepy, even though he admittedly is. If Luke can eat human food without a problem, then why is he freaking out? Unless he really is a human, in which case, maybe Ashton’s a bad date…

“You’re no help,” Luke says. “No, you can’t come get me, then what’s Ashton gonna think?” Ashton doesn’t know what he would think, but he’s getting more and more certain he’s a bad date. “Michael, it’s getting worse.”

Ashton pushes the door open just in time to hear Michael yelling about how he can’t be helpful if Luke hates every idea he has. Luke looks fine, if a little stressed. He’s got a hand around his throat and he’s looking into the mirror – Ashton notes that he does have a reflection. Luke turns around when he sees the door open. “Are you okay?” Ashton asks.

“I think I ate something I’m allergic to,” Luke says. He starts scratching at the base of his neck, looking even more stressed.

“Do you need to go to a hospital? Do you know what you ate?” Ashton takes a step toward Luke, but Luke steps back.

“I don’t need to go to a hospital, I’ll be fine,” Luke insists.

“Do you know what you’re allergic to?” Ashton asks. He’s more worried than anything, but when Luke doesn’t answer him, he circles back around to the reason he started talking to Luke in the first place. “Is it garlic?”

Luke’s eyes widen and he takes another step back, and his foot meets the wall behind him.

“I’m not—” Ashton is cut short when Luke literally turns into a bat and flies out the tiny window. He stares into the space where Luke had been standing, wondering what world he lives in where Luke has a reflection but can also turn into a bat. He’s still standing there when someone else opens the door and walks past him, mumbling about how he shouldn’t be standing in front of the door.

An hour later, after paying the check and bringing the rest of his dinner home because he was admittedly still hungry, he’s wondering what to do about Luke. He can’t tell if Luke’s reaction was just him being embarrassed or more likely scared for his life, but then he should have figured Calum was smarter than to not pick up on Ashton hunting his friends. Luke hadn’t seemed scared of him at the shop though, which left Ashton confused, but above it all, still worried about however much garlic Luke had eaten. He can’t decide if it’s better for him to ask if Luke is okay over text or if he should give him space, but he’s getting far too antsy just sitting around wondering if Luke is hurt somehow. If his family knew he didn’t take advantage of a vampire’s weakness, he’d be disowned.

**To text Luke, go to[chapter 54](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255627). To not text Luke, go to [chapter 55](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27502114/chapters/67255660).**


	46. Chapter 46

Ashton approaches the counter and Luke smiles at him expectantly for a moment before he remembers he’s here for a reason. “How can I help you today?”

“I had some questions about my plant, how to take care of it and all that.”

“Are you a plant killer?” Luke asks.

“Yeah. Either I water them too much or not enough, you know?”

“Well it’s an air plant, so it doesn’t need a ton of water. I recommend giving it a little spray once a week and then leaving it upside down to dry.” Ashton is taking mental notes, because he realizes this is actually new information for him, but it’s not exactly leading him anywhere as far as casual conversation. Luke finishes by pointing him in the direction of some air plant fertilizer and then moves along to the next customer in line.

Ashton thanks him and takes the little air plant pamphlet Luke pushed in his direction. There are a handful of other customers milling around, so he figures Luke is too busy to notice he never comes back to buy any fertilizer. His plan might have been better executed on a slower day, he thinks as he walks out. However, now that he’s exhausted his last idea, he doesn’t know what to do.

On his way home, he passes a billboard advertising a yoga retreat, and thinks it can’t possibly hurt. He goes home and googles it and books the first open spot for a week from that day. He spends the days leading up to the day he’s meant to leave building up the courage to call his mother and tell her he’s not hunting anymore, and he plans on hanging up before she can begin to chide him for wasting his potential. If he comes back from the yoga retreat, it’s going to be with a lighter mind and spirit. If he comes back from the yoga retreat at all.

**The end.**


	47. Chapter 47

Luke pulls the door open and groans when he sees Calum, but Calum pushes past him to Michael. “You guys are in trouble.” Luke closes the door.

Michael looks up from where he’s been looking at his phone. “What?”

“There’s a hunter out there. I think he knows about you.”

“This better not be a ploy,” Michael says with a straight face.

“It’s not a ploy or a joke. Luke.” Calum turns to him. “The guy you were flirting with at the shop? It’s him!”

“Luke was flirting with someone?” Michael asks, sounding amused.

“Ashton?” Luke asks in disbelief.

“Didn’t hear you ask his name,” Calum says with a smirk, and Michael lets out a short laugh.

“I saw it on his credit card,” Luke says. “That’s not the point. How do you know he’s a hunter?”

“I just _saw_ him outside!” Calum says. “He was here just now, and he was at the shop, and then he asked me about vampires—”

“What did he ask?” Luke interrupts.

“I can’t remember exactly, but he mentioned them in a weird way and I got the feeling he was gonna try to get me to say something about you two, so I left.”

“You ran away?” Michael asks. “As if that’s not suspicious?”

“No, I pretended to leave and then followed him and he went _back_ to the flower shop, and I got pictures of him creeping behind the counter.”

“Calum, you’ve officially gone crazy,” Luke says.

“You took pictures?” Michael asks. He holds out his hand for Calum’s phone, so he opens up the pictures and hands it over.

“What if he was stealing money or something?” Luke asks.

“These are so blurry,” Michael says.

“I took them from across the street,” Calum says defensively. “I didn’t want him to recognize me. And you can ask Sam if he stole money. She caught him behind the counter.” Luke frowns but pulls out his phone, probably to text her.

“What if he really is a hunter?” Michael asks, voice wavering a little.

“Well at least you know who he is,” Calum says to Luke.

“I can look through the transactions tomorrow to see if I can get more information on him.”

“You think it’s smart to go back to work after this?” Michael says. “He knows who you are.”

“If I don’t go back to work, he might figure out he tipped us off. Plus, I might find something helpful. Like his address.”

“Or his number.” Michael rolls his eyes. “So you can flirt with him more.”

“What should I do?” Calum asks.

“Stay out of it,” Luke says, but Michael stops him.

“No, Calum can help.”

“He can?” Luke asks.

Michael turns to Calum. “Do you think you can distract him?”

“How?”

“I don’t know, bond with him over vampires or whatever while Luke and I leave town and then try to get him to leave too, _without_ killing anyone.”

“You think he can do all that?” Luke asks.

“I can,” Calum says indignantly before he’s thought about the plan in depth.

“Good. There we go. We’ll be gone by the end of the week.” Michael looks at Luke like he’s daring him to disagree.

Like clockwork, Calum runs into Ashton the next day at the coffee shop instead of going to work, and once he’s made sure that Michael isn’t working, Calum sits down across from Ashton and calls him out on knowing about vampires. Ashton denies it at first, but then Calum starts enthusing about how cool vampires are, he feels Ashton letting his guard down. Before long, Ashton is confiding in him that he thinks Michael and Luke are vampires, and Calum tells him he’s being ridiculous. Calum is set on convincing Ashton that Michael and Luke aren’t vampires, but then suddenly they’re talking about music and not about vampires at all.

It’s Ashton’s idea for them to meet up again the next day, and Calum has to admit he has to go back to work eventually, so Ashton suggests they get lunch together near Calum’s office somewhere. Calum spends the whole hour wondering if this is a date, but it’s confirmed when Ashton walks him back to his office and asks if he’s free the next day as well. Calum almost forgets he’s supposed to be distracting Ashton, but then, they haven’t talked about vampires outside that first day, so maybe there’s something more substantial there after all.

By the end of the week, when Calum knows for a fact that Michael and Luke have left town for someplace on the east coast, he casually mentions to Ashton that he’s getting tired of Austin and that there are too many bats here. Whether or not Ashton picks up on the hint about vampires, he emphatically agrees and admits that he’s always wanted to live in California but he hasn’t been able to because of work. Ashton still hasn’t admitted to Calum that he’s a hunter, but he seems to have forgotten about the whole thing when Calum asks impulsively what’s stopping him. Ashton looks surprised when he says there’s nothing anymore, and before they know it they’ve decided to move out there together. They find a house to rent and if Ashton has any qualms with the price, he doesn’t mention it. They drive out together in a U-haul loaded with both their belongings, and they don’t start the trip hand in hand, but they might just end it that way.

**The end.**


	48. Chapter 48

Calum goes to work and pulls a water bottle from the fridge that probably belonged to someone else and sticks his sunflower in the top. The leaves are wide enough that the flower sits tall and happy about halfway into the bottle. He kind of wishes he had a real vase or at least a glass to put the flower in, but it’s either this or stealing someone’s coffee mug, and none of them are tall enough. One of the paralegals compliments the flower as she hurries by. All the lawyers are always hurrying here and there; it makes Calum reconsider wanting to become a lawyer eventually. It’s definitely a decision he’s considered as much as he’s thought about being a vampire. The two ideas happened to connect one day when he realized that if he’s immortal, it gives him even more time to study and pass the bar and do a lot more for a lot more people. He’s also quite motivated by the thought of being able to save up from years of boring contract law to do pro-bono work. He thinks of how he’d love to hack the US supreme court system’s lifetime appointments by getting a seat and literally never dying.

Regardless, if he’s going to be a vampire, his first task is probably to keep the vampires alive who are most likely to turn him. Ashton doesn’t seem dangerous from their brief interaction. If anything, he seems a little ditzy, or maybe distracted, or maybe just not asking the right questions. If he goes back to the juice bar to warn them about Ashton, will he just get kicked out again?

Calum sends this idea to Luke, along with a question about whether Ashton has been by. He knows Luke won’t answer until after his shift since his phone is always in the back, but he doesn’t want Luke to think he doesn’t care. He keeps looking at his sunflower and makes a mental note to take it home at the end of the day so it doesn’t sit here in the cold office and freeze overnight.

Sure enough, when he takes a break for lunch he has a reply from Luke: _Ashton didn’t show up, and please don’t go there by yourself_

Calum isn’t insulted at this point that Luke doesn’t think he can handle going to the bar by himself, after all, he and Michael have a point when they warn him about being drained. He knows from eavesdropping that vampires have ways of getting rid of bodies. It’s one of the few things about them that still makes him nervous. _Fine I won’t_ , he sends back.

Within seconds, Luke is inviting him to hang out at his apartment, and Calum wonders what changed between yesterday and then to make Luke change his mind. Of course he accepts.

Half an hour after he’s done with work, Calum is walking into Luke’s apartment, which seems empty. Sure enough, Luke informs him that Michael is out for the evening. “He found himself a date.”

“A date? Who’s scary enough to date him?”

“Scary enough?” Luke asks.

“No, I mean, he’s intimidating. Who asked him out?”

“Michael asked him. It’s weird. But I told him I’d be here in case it goes bad so I figured you could keep me company.” Luke smiles at him sweetly.

“What could go wrong?” Calum asks.

“It’s with a human,” Luke says. “Better safe than sorry.”

“He’s smart enough to not eat garlic on a date.” Calum is trying to stay on topic, but Luke is watching him very intently, as if he’s telling a riveting story and not just making conversation. “Did you have any plans for tonight or do you just not like being alone?”

“I like being alone, but I’d rather be with you.”

“Really?” Calum thinks back to Luke telling him just yesterday that they couldn’t date, but shakes himself out of it just as quickly. He shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth.

“Wanna play a video game? Michael has a ton of games.”

“Sure?”

Every time Calum even thinks about bringing up Ashton, Luke says something that makes him wonder if Luke really was just being pressured by Michael to push Calum away. Luke hadn’t been lying yesterday when he said he liked Calum, he had no doubt, and unless vampires have weird mind-reading powers he’s unaware of, there’s no reason for Luke to be treating him so nicely.

“Are you even trying?” Luke says after Calum loses an easy race.

“Just thinking,” Calum replies.

“Don’t hurt yourself,” Luke laughs.

“Is this a date?”

Luke doesn’t think about it for long. “I would have told you it was a date before inviting you over, but if you want, I can buy you dinner and we can call that part a date.”

“We can?”

“Yes? Is that something you’d want?” Luke asks slowly, a grin growing across his face.

There’s not much Calum wants more in the moment, but he also can’t figure out what to say that won’t make him sound stupidly eager, so he just nods, and Luke smiles even bigger.

One Chinese takeout and a lot of distracted flirting later, Michael arrives home and looks surprised to see Calum there. Calum is bracing for Michael to be upset, but he’s not.

“How was your date?” Luke asks.

“Weirdly okay?” says Michael. “How’s yours?”

Luke glances at Calum. “Pretty weird himself.”

Michael exhales a laugh and shakes his head as he walks away. Luke tells Calum to wait a minute while he talks to Michael, so obviously Calum gets up and tiptoes as close to the wall as he can without being seen around the corner.

They’re whispering, so Calum only picks up some of the conversation, but he hears Luke ask if they should keep Calum here overnight so he doesn’t do anything stupid. Calum should be offended – and he would be able to stop himself from doing anything stupid without their help if they told him what they’re planning – but he hears Luke say goodnight to Michael and then both of them laugh like it’s an inside joke, so Calum shuffles back to the couch.

He intends on pretend-yawning, but yawns for real when Luke comes back into the room. “I think I should head home.”

“Do you want me to drive you?” Luke asks. “Or are you awake enough?”

“I’m good,” he says, mostly to see if Luke will stop him, but he doesn’t. “It’s not even 10.”

“If you’re sure,” Luke says. He walks Calum to the door. “Text me when you get home safe.” Calum is about to say okay, he will, when Luke leans forward and presses a kiss to his cheek.

A week later, Luke is waiting for Calum to get out of the bathroom so they can leave for their first planned date. Michael is walking around all moony-eyed about his new boyfriend, and suddenly he’s a lot less intimidating. Calum hasn’t forgotten about Ashton, but he never comes up anymore, so he figures someone at the bar must have taken care of him. It’s weird how he hasn’t seen much of Ashton lately.

Luke gives him a new flower every day before work – today’s choice is a dark purple rose – and he refuses to question how long it’ll last. He hasn’t exactly given up on being turned, but he’s not about to risk this new thing with Luke just for that. Being with Luke is more than a fair trade.

“Calum, are you ready to go?” Luke calls.

He’s been staring at his own reflection for a whole minute, overthinking, so that’s more than enough. He hears Luke laughing when he opens the door. “What’s so funny?” he calls as he walks into the living room to see Luke standing at the door, nearly doubled over in laughter. The person on the other side of the door is half hidden by a huge teddy bear, and if this is Michael’s date, he understands why it’s so funny. He walks up to Luke and gets a better look and realizes it’s Ashton.

Calum grabs Luke’s arm and whispers that that’s Ashton, the hunter, and Luke just tells him it’s okay and holds his hand, like he knows Calum is about to start yelling.

“Don’t just leave him out in the hall,” Michael says as he walks in from his bedroom. Calum wouldn’t be able to tell just from looking at him that he’s been trying to get his hair to look perfect for the last half hour.

“You never mentioned he was the type to buy you teddy bears, Mike.” Luke is still laughing, and aside from the fact that it’s Ashton, Calum agrees it’s a pretty funny sight. He never thought of Michael as the teddy bear type.

“I won the bear myself, thank you,” Michael says to Luke.

“So you’re not going to introduce us to your new boyfriend?” Luke asks.

“What happened to him being a hunter?” Calum bursts out.

Michael turns back to Ashton. “He quit?” Ashton says.

“He- you quit? Why?”

Ashton looks at Michael, equally lovelorn as Michael looked earlier.

“Gross,” Luke says.

“You knew about this?” Calum asks Luke.

“Can you leave already?” Michael asks.

Luke sighs and tugs Calum out the door.

“You knew about this?” Calum repeats.

“Yes, and I didn’t want you getting in the middle of it,” Luke says, finally gathering himself after laughing for so long. “You were acting like you were ready to fight him yourself, and I didn’t want you to get hurt because you can’t understand that I don’t need protecting.”

“So Michael is dating a hunter and you’re just okay with that? What if _he_ gets hurt?”

“Michael can take care of himself. He’s worse about flying in public anyway.” Luke squeezes Calum’s hand. “Michael asked me not to tell you until he was sure Ashton was serious about quitting hunting.”

“You really believe him?”

“He said Ashton took him into a hall of mirrors so that Michael would have the advantage if he wanted to fight back.”

“How would he have the advantage?”

“He thought Michael wouldn’t have a reflection.” Luke smirks and all the humor of the night reveals itself to Calum. “You see why I’m not worried?”

All the flowers from the week have led to Luke leading Calum around the botanical gardens all afternoon. Luke names the plants he knows as they pass them and Calum doesn’t try to hide it when he starts taking endless pictures of Luke clearly in his element.

“Why are you taking pictures of me and not the flowers?” Luke asks.

“There are flowers in the pictures,” Calum says, turning his phone around to show him. Luke just rolls his eyes and takes Calum’s free hand, swinging it between them as they walk. “I’m glad you decided to give me a chance, even if it was just to keep me distracted from fighting Michael’s boyfriend.”

“I wasn’t lying when I said I liked you before. Just took me spending time with you while you’re not trying to get me to turn you to find that out.”

“I think I’ve changed my mind about that.”

“You don’t want to be turned anymore?”

“Not more than I want to keep being with you.”

“Open for discussion eventually?”

Calum almost stops walking. “What do you mean?”

Luke smiles. “Maybe I’ll want to keep you around a little longer.”

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Congratulations! You've reached one of the ending-endings!


	49. Chapter 49

Calum goes to work and pulls a water bottle from the fridge that probably belonged to someone else and sticks his sunflower in the top. The leaves are wide enough that the flower sits tall and happy about halfway into the bottle. He kind of wishes he had a real vase or at least a glass to put the flower in, but it’s either this or stealing someone’s coffee mug, and none of them are tall enough. One of the paralegals compliments the flower as she hurries by, but he barely notices.

As soon as he’s gone through the motions of starting to work, he pulls out his phone and texts Luke saying the sunflower is brightening up his desk. He knows he won’t get a reply while Luke is still at work, because he keeps his phone in the back, but he stares at the sunflower all morning.

At lunch, he still doesn’t have a reply from Luke. He’d not one to back away from double texting, so he sends a message crafted over a sandwich that he hopes comes across as flirty and not just weird.

Still no reply from Luke after work, when he knows for a fact Luke finished work a few hours ago.

When he gets to dinner and has no reply, he thinks maybe Luke write down the wrong number, or maybe he put it in his phone wrong.

The next morning, he goes by the flower shop again, and this time Luke looks less happy to see him.

“Are you making a habit of coming in every day before work now too?” Luke asks, an edge to his voice.

“I wasn’t planning on it, I was just wondering if you gave me the right number—”

“I did, and now I regret it.”

“But why?”

“Because I should have known you would just double down on wanting me to turn you.”

“When did I say that?”

“You went from concerned friend to one-track-mind pretty fast, don’t you think?”

“But I didn’t—”

“Calum _please_ , just leave. I don’t want to have to keep telling you no.”

Calum does as he’s told, goes to work and goes through the motions again, and ends up moving the still-perky sunflower into the breakroom just so that he doesn’t have to keep staring at it. He considers texting Luke an apology, since clearly Luke doesn’t want to see him again, but he can’t figure out what he did wrong that he’s even apologizing for. The more he thinks about it, he starts to think Luke might be right. Luke is tired of saying no to him, and he’s about equally tired of being rejected. When it was only saying no to turning him, it wasn’t so bad, but now that it’s a rejection of Calum as a person, it feels like he should have stopped trying a long time ago.

He spends the afternoon trying to see if the law office has a branch anywhere else, and when he sees there is one in another state, he puts in a transfer request immediately, citing his need for a change in scenery as his reason for leaving. Anyway, he got this job through a relative, maybe he can get the next one that way too.

The request is approved by the time he gets into the office the next morning, and so Calum spends the rest of the day researching where to live and when to leave and trying to forget about the possibility of meeting any vampires there.

**The end.**


	50. Chapter 50

Michael doesn’t have to try very hard to convince Calum to stay. “It’s a little late for you to drive home” is enough for Calum to say okay and tuck himself fully under Michael’s arm. Eventually, Michael tugs Calum up off the couch and into bed, where Calum changes into one of Michael’s soft shirts and doesn’t let go of Michael until he’s fully asleep.

Michael must get up eventually, because Calum’s eyes blink open around 4 am when he hears loud voices. He assumes it’s Michael and Luke at first, since vampires don’t sleep, but just as he closes his eyes, he realizes there are three people talking. He opens his eyes again and sits up. He hears the one voice he doesn’t recognize say Ashton’s name. Curiosity gets the best of him after a minute of trying to make out what more than just the one voice is saying, because Michael and Luke seem to understand that humans sleep even if they don’t. He gets up and tiptoes out into the hall.

“Look, all I’m saying is, his family is a long line of hunters,” the stranger’s voice says. “It’s not that big a leap to think maybe this guy is keeping with tradition.”

Calum sneaks up to the edge of the hallway where he can see all three of them right as Michael says, in a quieter voice, “He’s come to where I work enough times that he could have done something if he wanted to, but he hasn’t yet.”

“He’s been to where I work too, and I’m still here. Doesn’t that mean something?” Luke asks.

“Maybe he’s waiting for backup, I don’t know, but you don’t know he’s not dangerous. Don’t you dare say he’s cute,” the stranger says, pointing at Luke and rolling his eyes. He sees Calum then, and stiffens.

Michael and Luke follow his gaze to see Calum standing there, looking sleepy.

“I didn’t realize you had a guest,” the stranger says. “Shouldn’t you go back to bed too?”

Michael walks over to Calum and winds an arm around his waist. “It’s cool, Jack. He knows.”

“Oh, okay,” Jack says, relaxing.

“But you’re right, we should go back to bed,” Michael says, pulling Calum closer. “You two figure out what you’re gonna do, and try to keep it down.” He squeezes Calum’s waist and pulls him back to his bedroom.

“What was that about?” Calum asks.

“He’s a buddy from the bar,” Michael says.

_A vampire_ , Calum thinks vaguely. He crawls into bed and Michael climbs in beside him. “Why do you still have a bed if you don’t sleep?” Calum asks, snuggling back up to Michael.

Michael smiles and starts carding his fingers through Calum’s hair again, which puts him to sleep almost immediately. “For things like this, obviously,” Michael says softly. “Plus I had a bed before I got turned, I wasn’t just going to get rid of it, that would be like…” Calum is asleep before he hears the end of the sentence.

Instead of waking up to voices the next morning, Calum wakes up to Michael’s hand patting his shoulder.

“Cal?” Michael says gently. “You gotta get up for work.”

Calum groans and pulls the blanket up.

“I’ll make you coffee,” Michael offers.

“Wouldn’t you do that anyway?” Calum grumbles. “’S too early.”

“It’s 8.”

“Time isn’t real.”

Michael laughs and kisses the top of Calum’s head, which is the only part of him that’s not buried in blankets. “Your office doesn’t know that, and neither does the coffee shop. Come on.”

Calum’s work shirt from the day before is magically hanging up in the bathroom, and might also be ironed, which is honestly not something he gets around to himself half the time. When he asks Michael about it, he just gets a smile in return. As promised, Michael gives Calum a latte, a scone, and a kiss before sending him off to work. Work itself is a drag until Michael appears beside his car when he walks out.

The pattern repeats every day for a week – and Calum figures out Michael is flying to his office in the daytime, which he isn’t thrilled with – until next Sunday when Calum gets off work early. Michael is still waiting outside for him, and Calum is still worried someone will catch him, but they still sit in Calum’s car for too long, distracting each other with kisses and anecdotes until Calum drives Michael back home. This time, he follows Michael up and Michael is holding Calum’s hand, swinging their hands back and forth in a comically large arc all the way down the hall to the apartment. They unlock the door and walk in and Michael freezes. Calum almost crashes into his back but then peeks around Michael to see what’s happening.

On the couch, thankfully seated and even more thankfully clothed, are Luke and Ashton, hands in each other’s hair, making out so intently that neither of them heard the door unlock. Michael reaches around Calum to slam the door shut and Ashton jumps a little. Luke turns around to look at Michael like he’s interrupting.

“ _This_ is what you wouldn’t tell me about?” Michael asks.

“You’d tell me I was being an idiot,” Luke says, and Ashton looks a little offended.

“I’d be right. I told Calum to stay out of it and he listened, why couldn’t you?”

Luke starts to argue with Michael. Behind him, Calum feels a little offended as well. He gives Ashton a small wave and Ashton waves back sheepishly before running a hand through his disheveled hair.

“So what’s going on here?” Michael asks Luke, and Calum tunes back in because he’s interested in the answer as well. Despite his concern, he’d forgotten to keep checking in on Ashton, especially since he was never at the coffee shop in the mornings anymore.

“What does it look like?” Luke asks, like Michael is stupid.

“No but how? Why?”

“Can I?” Ashton asks, raising his hand. Luke gestures for him to go ahead. “I’m not a hunter anymore. I quit.”

“Why?” Calum asks, and Michael turns to him briefly before looking back at Ashton.

“Because vampires aren’t bad like I was taught they were, or, are. Or, aren’t. I mean, you have reflections, you don’t burn up in the daylight, you don’t kill people, you can eat garlic—” Michael must make a face, because Ashton cuts himself off. “You can’t eat garlic?”

“That one happens to be true,” Michael says. “But how come you two are…?” He waves his hands in their direction as a replacement for finishing the sentence with real words.

“Because I was right about Ashton liking me,” Luke says almost smugly.

“You gave up hunting vampires because of him?” Calum asks Ashton, who nods and then smiles sappily at Luke.

“You guys are gross,” Michael declares, pulling Calum behind him to his room.

“That’s it?” Calum asks. “You’re not worried about him anymore?”

Michael sighs. “Luke told me he was taking care of it, and I had no idea what he meant, but apparently it involved seducing him or whatever.”

“How is that a bad thing?” Calum laughs.

“It’s just gross, you saw them.” Michael pulls Calum in closer by the waist. “We’re cuter.” Calum agrees. Michael leans in close enough to kiss him, but holds back by barely an inch. “Anyway, I’ve been thinking about your offer.”

“What offer?” Calum asks dazedly, blinking at how close Michael’s lips are.

“To turn you,” Michael says, which snaps Calum back to reality.

He takes a small step back, but Michael’s hands are still at his waist. “What do you mean?”

“If you really want to be a vampire, I’ll do it. Especially if it means we can be together even longer.”

“Forever,” Calum breathes.

“Well we’re not _immortal_ ,” Michael says. “We just age really slowly. But you know what you’re getting into by now. And I like having you around. And it would be easier to date if we’re on the same schedule as far as sleeping.”

Calum doesn’t think about it as much as lets the idea flow through his head. “Would we keep the bed?”

“We could do more in a bed than just sleep,” Michael says, mirroring Calum’s grin. “What do you say?”

Calum leans back in and whispers against Michael’s mouth before locking him in a kiss, “Bite me.”

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Congratulations! You've reached one of the ending-endings!


	51. Chapter 51

“It’s a little late for you to drive yourself home, isn’t it?” Michael doesn’t have to push Calum on it; if he’s willing to drive Calum home, who is Calum to say no?

Calum gives Michael directions as he tries not to fall asleep in his own passenger seat. He keeps looking over at Michael as the streetlights catch his face in flashes of the weirdest expressions he’s making as he sings along to whatever Calum’s phone had started automatically playing when they got in the car. Calum giggles at Michael’s attempt to hit a particularly high note. Before he knows it, they’re home and Michael isn’t fighting it when Calum pulls him by the wrist to his bedroom and attaches himself to Michael’s side as soon as they’re in his bed. If Michael had plans to go back, he definitely doesn’t say anything, just wraps an arm around Calum and uses his free hand to trace little shapes on Calum’s arm until he’s asleep.

Calum isn’t exactly surprised when he wakes up alone in his bed, though he had hoped Michael would stay. As usual, he’s woken up about ten minutes before his alarm. He rubs at his eyes and considers taking the shortest nap before the alarm goes off, but then he smells the distinct aroma of something cooking. The smell pulls him out of bed and into the kitchen, where Michael is walking around in just his shirt and boxers, apparently having decided his jeans were too uncomfortable to pretend to sleep in, not that Calum remembers.

“Morning,” Calum says.

Michael turns around, looking surprised. “You’re not supposed to be awake yet.”

“I always wake up right before my alarm,” Calum tries to explain, but Michael waves his hands at him.

“This is supposed to be breakfast in bed, go back to bed!”

Calum is too sleepy to argue, so he just pads back to bed and wills himself to stay awake for the few minutes it takes Michael to carry in a plate and a mug of coffee. “You don’t have to keep feeding me you know,” he says as Michael settles back in beside him.

“Gotta make sure your blood is nice and nutrient-rich for later though.” Calum shakes his head fondly. “And you don’t have any flavored syrups so this is just boring coffee.”

“Oh, I guess I forgive you.”

“I thought I’d have to do more convincing,” Michael says, leaning over and nosing at Calum’s neck.

Calum blinks. “No, you’re right, I’m upset with you.”

“Are you?” Michael’s breath is warm against his skin.

“So upset.”

Michael hums as he licks Calum’s neck, sending shivers through his whole body.

“Angry, even.”

“Anything I can do to make it up to you?” Michael asks, eyes the picture of faux innocence when he leans back just enough to look up at Calum’s face. He runs his tongue over his teeth and Calum sees that he has his fangs out.

“There is one thing…” Calum says quietly, as if he’ll scare Michael away.

“What’s that?” Michael asks, tilting his head. His fingers are still ghosting up and down Calum’s neck.

“I—”

Calum’s alarm goes off and both he and Michael jump a little. Michael starts laughing as he hands Calum’s phone to him so he can turn the alarm off. Calum’s heart is pounding more than he’d realized, now that Michael isn’t touching any part of him to distract from his nerves.

“Come on, you aren’t actually upset,” Michael says, poking Calum’s cheek. “Finish your breakfast.”

Calum doesn’t know how to ask Michael if he’d been serious or just caught up in teasing Calum. He nods and takes another bite of his toast.

Michael must pick up that he’s not just pretending to be uncomfortable. His voice softens as he speaks. “I’ll make you a fancy coffee if you drop me off at work on your way?” He kisses Calum’s cheek.

“Would you have done it?” Calum asks.

“Not without asking,” Michael says, which is both comforting and makes Calum feel like he’ll have to try harder next time. Damn his alarm. “I might just like having you around.”

“Enough to keep me around forever?” Calum asks, going for jokey but landing on this side of earnest.

“Moving fast for a second date, aren’t we?” Michael asks. He reaches out to touch Calum’s arm gently with just the tips of his fingers. “I can’t say I’d hate it though.”

Eventually, Michael convinces Calum to get up and get ready for work. Calum drops him off at the coffee shop. As promised, Michael gives him a latte, a scone, and a kiss before sending him off to the office. Work itself is a drag until Michael appears beside his car when he walks out.

The pattern repeats every day for a week – and Calum figures out Michael is flying to his office in the daytime, which he isn’t thrilled with – until next Sunday when Calum gets off work early. Michael is still waiting outside for him, and Calum is still worried someone will catch him, but they still sit in Calum’s car for too long, distracting each other with kisses and anecdotes until Calum drives Michael back home. This time, he follows Michael up and Michael is holding Calum’s hand, swinging their hands back and forth in a comically large arc all the way down the hall to the apartment. They unlock the door and walk in and Michael freezes. Calum almost crashes into his back but then peeks around Michael to see what’s happening.

On the couch, thankfully seated and even more thankfully clothed, are Luke and Ashton, hands in each other’s hair, making out so intently that neither of them heard the door unlock. Michael reaches around Calum to slam the door shut and Ashton jumps a little. Luke turns around to look at Michael like he’s interrupting.

“ _This_ is what you wouldn’t tell me about?” Michael asks.

“You’d tell me I was being an idiot,” Luke says, and Ashton looks a little offended.

“I’d be right. I told Calum to stay out of it and he listened, why couldn’t you?”

Luke starts to argue with Michael. Behind him, Calum feels a little offended as well. He gives Ashton a small wave and Ashton waves back sheepishly before running a hand through his disheveled hair.

“So what’s going on here?” Michael asks Luke, and Calum tunes back in because he’s interested in the answer as well. Despite his concern, he’d forgotten to keep checking in on Ashton, especially since he was never at the coffee shop in the mornings anymore.

“What does it look like?” Luke asks, like Michael is stupid.

“No but how? Why?”

“Can I?” Ashton asks, raising his hand. Luke gestures for him to go ahead. “I’m not a hunter anymore. I quit.”

“Why?” Calum asks, and Michael turns to him briefly before looking back at Ashton.

“Because vampires aren’t bad like I was taught they were, or, are. Or, aren’t. I mean, you have reflections, you don’t burn up in the daylight, you don’t kill people, you can eat garlic—” Michael must make a face, because Ashton cuts himself off. “You can’t eat garlic?”

“That one happens to be true,” Michael says. “But how come you two are…?” He waves his hands in their direction as a replacement for finishing the sentence with real words.

“Because I was right about Ashton liking me,” Luke says almost smugly.

“You gave up hunting vampires because of him?” Calum asks Ashton, who nods and then smiles sappily at Luke.

“You guys are gross,” Michael declares, pulling Calum behind him to his room.

“That’s it?” Calum asks. “You’re not worried about him anymore?”

Michael sighs. “Luke told me he was taking care of it, and I had no idea what he meant, but apparently it involved seducing him or whatever.”

“How is that a bad thing?” Calum laughs.

“It’s just gross, you saw them.” Michael pulls Calum in closer by the waist. “We’re cuter.” Calum agrees. Michael leans in close enough to kiss him, but holds back by barely an inch. “Anyway, I’ve been thinking about what almost happened.”

“Almost happened?” Calum repeats dazedly, blinking at how close Michael’s lips are.

“About me biting you,” Michael says, which snaps Calum back to reality.

He takes a small step back, but Michael’s hands are still at his waist. “What do you mean?”

“If you really want to be a vampire, I’ll do it. Especially if it means we can be together even longer.”

“Forever,” Calum breathes.

“Well we’re not _immortal_ ,” Michael says. “We just age really slowly. But you know what you’re getting into by now.”

“So you’ll do it?”

“Only if you’re sure it’s what you want.”

Calum lifts a hand up to the side of his neck.

“You know I don’t _have_ to bite your neck, right?” Michael says, bringing one of his hands up to rest on top of Calum’s. Calum knows, in theory. That doesn’t change the fact that he’s been imagining it this way since he was a teenager. “So?”

Calum pulls his hand out from under Michael’s so that Michael has full access to his neck. “Sink your teeth into me.”

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Congratulations! You've reached one of the ending-endings!


	52. Chapter 52

Calum runs up to the apartment and bangs on their door as soon as he gets the chance. Luke pulls the door open and groans when he sees Calum, but Calum pushes past him to Michael. “You guys are in trouble.” Luke closes the door.

Michael looks up from where he’s been looking at his phone. “What?”

“There’s a hunter out there. I think he knows about you.”

“This better not be a ploy,” Michael says with a straight face.

“It’s not a ploy. I just _saw_ him outside!” Calum says. “He was here just now, and he was at the shop, and then he asked me about vampires—”

“What did he ask?” Luke interrupts.

“I can’t remember exactly, but he mentioned them in a weird way and I got the feeling he was gonna try to get me to say something about you two, so I pretended to leave and then followed him and he went _back_ to the flower shop, and I got pictures of him creeping behind the counter.”

“Calum, you’ve officially gone crazy,” Luke says.

“You took pictures?” Michael asks. He holds out his hand for Calum’s phone, so he opens up the pictures and hands it over.

“What if he was stealing money or something?” Luke asks.

“These are so blurry,” Michael says.

“I took them from across the street,” Calum says defensively. “I didn’t want him to recognize me. And you can ask Sam if he stole money. She caught him behind the counter.”

Luke frowns but pulls out his phone, probably to text her.

Michael hands Calum’s phone back. “You need to find a better hobby.”

“I’m trying to warn you!” Calum says.

“Based on this stranger possibly being a thief?”

“Based on him being weird about vampires.”

“Like you’re weird about vampires?” Michael asks.

“Sam says he didn’t steal any money and that he was just acting weird.” Luke rejoins them.

“A lot of people are weird, Cal,” Michael says pointedly.

Calum sighs. “Fine. Don’t come crying to me when you guys get hunted.”

“Hunters don’t exist,” Michael and Luke say almost in sync.

Calum pockets his phone and leaves the apartment. He considers being more insistent, but if they’re not going to believe him, there’s nothing else he can do. He goes home and goes about his life as if he’s not preoccupied with vampires at all, let alone a specific one.

After a few days of pretending to be boring, he gets bored of it and decides maybe he’s better off giving himself a clean start. He decides to move out west and grow his hair out, and somewhere along the line also decides to hire a personal trainer. He hasn’t been giving his fitness as much attention as he should have due to the vampire distraction, so he figures this will be good for him. The moment his trainer shows up at his place for the first time, he can tell he’s over vampires forever.

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Personal Trainer dead end was inspired by [Anna's](https://ashtcnirwin.tumblr.com/) [personal trainer cashton fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26471149) if you're interested in seeing how that au plays out. Note that it is rated E (not E for everyone).


	53. Chapter 53

Calum runs up to the apartment and bangs on their door as soon as he gets the chance. Michael pulls the door open and groans when he sees Calum, but Calum pushes past him to Luke. “You guys are in trouble.” Michael closes the door.

Luke looks up from where he’s been looking at his phone. “What?”

“There’s a hunter out there. I think he knows about you.”

“This better not be a joke,” Luke says with a straight face.

“It’s not a joke. I just _saw_ him outside!” Calum says. “He was here just now, and he was at the shop, and then he asked me about vampires—”

“What did he ask?” Michael interrupts.

“I can’t remember exactly, but he mentioned them in a weird way and I got the feeling he was gonna try to get me to say something about you two, so I pretended to leave and then followed him and he went _back_ to the flower shop, and I got pictures of him creeping behind the counter.”

“Cal, you’ve officially gone crazy,” Luke says.

“You took pictures?” Michael asks. He holds out his hand for Calum’s phone, so he opens up the pictures and hands it over.

“What if he was stealing money or something?” Luke asks.

“These are so blurry,” Michael says.

“I took them from across the street,” Calum says defensively. “I didn’t want him to recognize me. And you can ask Sam if he stole money. She caught him behind the counter.”

Luke frowns but pulls out his phone, probably to text her.

Michael hands Calum’s phone back. “You need to find a better hobby.”

“I’m trying to warn you!” Calum says.

“Based on this stranger possibly being a thief?”

“Based on him being weird about vampires.”

“Like you’re weird about vampires?” Michael asks.

“Sam says he didn’t steal any money and that he was just acting weird.” Luke rejoins them.

“A lot of people are weird, Calum,” Michael says pointedly.

Calum sighs. “Fine. Don’t come crying to me when you guys get hunted.”

“Hunters don’t exist,” Michael and Luke say almost in sync.

Calum pockets his phone and leaves the apartment. He considers being more insistent, but if they’re not going to believe him, there’s nothing else he can do. He goes home and goes about his life as if he’s not preoccupied with vampires at all, let alone a specific one. He gets bored of the routine, so he takes some time off work to go visit his family. The first thing his mom says when she sees him is that he needs a haircut, so he decides to grow his hair out even longer out of spite. By the time his mom stops bothering him about his hair length, it’s too long for his taste as well, and he’s almost embarrassed to go to a barber to get it cut. As soon as he finds himself thinking it’s unfair that the length somehow works better on Luke, he knows he can’t put it off any longer. He takes himself to the barber and spends a little too long staring through the window wondering if the cute stylist happens to be the one his appointment is with…

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Haircut dead end was inspired by [Meg's](https://kaleidoscopeminds.tumblr.com/) [haircut fix-it fic](https://kaleidoscopeminds.tumblr.com/post/628559206962839552/fingertips-on-me-i-can-feel-them-still-i-wrote) if you're interested in seeing how that au plays out. It's even more wonderful in context.


	54. Chapter 54

Ashton spends another hour fretting about texting Luke before he gives in and sends him a message asking if he’s okay. He gets no response, and of course he starts suspecting the worst, but he manages to convince himself Luke is probably just resting up, even if he’s not asleep. He continues to get no response, though he does get a message from his mother asking if he has any updates on the vampire. He hasn’t told her there are actually two vampires, and at first it had been a matter of pride because he didn’t want her to send one of his cousins out to help him, but now he’s glad he never did. He doesn’t plan on telling her about Luke at all, or Michael for that matter. On the chance that Luke hasn’t been scared off forever, the last thing he needs is to send one of his hot-headed cousins after Michael.

Ashton does as much digging as he can remotely into his family history. He knows the basics – they’ve been vampire hunters since the 1600s and rarely has anyone strayed from the path, at least not without being cut off from the family forever. He wonders if anyone has left the family to be with a vampire. He can’t be the first to consider it, he thinks, especially if they’re all as pretty as Luke. By morning, he hasn’t slept, and he knows for a fact Luke hasn’t either, so he doesn’t know how to deal with the fact that Luke hasn’t replied, or answered his calls.

He decides to go to the flower shop anyway. Luke’s not there, and the woman working there repeatedly tells him she can’t say why Luke is out until he wears her down enough for her to say he called in sick. Ashton rushes to Luke’s apartment. Suddenly his fears don’t seem as unsubstantiated. He waits by the front door for a couple minutes and then as soon as someone opens it from the inside to leave, he sends them a hasty thanks over his shoulder and runs up to the second floor where he knows the fourth window on the left side of the building is Luke’s.

Michael answers the door when he knocks. At first he looks surprised, and then pushes Ashton’s chest just hard enough that he takes a step back. Michael follows him out into the hall and closes the door behind him. “You need to leave,” he says firmly, crossing his arms.

“Is Luke okay?” Ashton barely gets out before Michael glares at him so hard he shuts up.

“Yeah, no thanks to you.”

“But I didn’t—”

“Look, if Luke wasn’t so fond of you for whatever reason, you wouldn’t be alive right now. Every vampire in the city knows about you, and most of us have never had fresh blood.” Michael wouldn’t bite him right there in the hall… unless he would. He seems to know what Ashton is thinking, because he grins wickedly, showing his fangs. “Landlord is a friend of ours.”

For lack of a better phrase, Ashton feels all the blood drain from his face. He didn’t think to bring any stakes with him, obviously, since he wasn’t planning on killing either of them.

“Leave,” Michael says. Ashton wants to ask him to pass on a message to Luke, to let him know he dropped by or _something_ at least, but he’s barely breathing as it is. “Leave the _city_ if you know what’s good for you.”

Ashton can’t speak, so he backs away down the hall from where Michael is staring after him to make sure he leaves. He considers calling his family for backup, but Michael had said “every vampire in the city” and he can’t imagine how high that number is.

He wonders if faking his death would be too dramatic for his family to handle, and decides he has other options. He ghosts them. He leaves his phone and laptop and all other technology in his old apartment, but packs all his clothes and his terrarium into his car. He drives out into the desert and dyes his hair black in some dodgy motel just off the freeway.

He reaches a town on the west coast where he makes the terrible decision to walk into the sketchiest bar he sees and asks if anyone there can help him disappear from his family. The bartender asks him if he’s sure he knows what he’s looking for, and he can’t afford to hesitate before saying yes. Next thing he knows, he’s been hired as a bartender and being pointed in the direction of someone who can fit him for a leather jacket.

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Bad Boy dead end was inspired by [Helen's](https://calumcest.tumblr.com/) [Fight So Dirty fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24152284) if you're interested in seeing how that au plays out. Helen please don't kill me for picking one of your not-necessarily-favourite fics to be inspired by.


	55. Chapter 55

Ashton spends the night worrying about Luke, but he can’t bring himself to text him, especially if Luke isn’t texting him first. He doesn’t want to be pushy… but he’s also worried, so instead of doing the smarter thing and just asking Luke if he’s okay, Ashton goes to the flower shop for the third morning in a row.

He doesn’t account for the possibility that Luke might not be there until he’s about to walk in, but there Luke is, looking a little worse for wear but not nearly as close to death as Ashton’s worst imagination had dreamt up. It must be a slow morning, because it’s well past opening time and there’s no one else in the shop. Luke’s eyes widen when he meet’s Ashton’s gaze.

“Nice to see you alive,” Ashton says, and immediately wishes he would have thought of something better to say.

“Thanks,” Luke says. He’s still smiling, but he looks far more uncomfortable than usual.

“I didn’t mean to scare you off yesterday,” Ashton says.

“I should have been more careful.” Luke taps his fingers on the counter. “Got a talking-to from Michael that would have made my mom proud. He wanted me to stay home from work today, but I’m fine, so…” He trails off, looking around at everything but Ashton.

“I didn’t know you could… fly?” Ashton finishes. He doesn’t know how much Luke’s workplace knows about him, so far be it from Ashton to say something.

Luke lets out a humorless laugh. “Yeah, didn’t really see another way out.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t ask sooner if you were okay, I just—”

“It’s fine,” Luke says. “I wouldn’t know what to say either. But, be honest, what do you know about me?”

“Um,” Ashton starts, and doesn’t know where to go from there.

“Because I know you’re a hunter. And I know you’re here for me. So, short of flying away again, what should I expect?”

“Well, I- wait, if you knew I was a hunter, why did you agree to go out with me?”

“Because I was optimistic.”

“But you’re not anymore?”

“I could be convinced.” Luke crosses his arms.

“I didn’t know you could fly, so obviously I don’t know as much as I thought. You also have a reflection.” Luke looks confused at that. “And you can eat real food?”

“What _do_ you know then?” Luke asks, sounding amused.

“That you’re not dangerous or evil or bad or even _mean_.” Ashton takes a careful step toward Luke, and then another; Luke doesn’t back away. “You gave me a chance even though, you know.”

“Against all advice. So what now? Still hunting me?”

“I think I’m off the clock,” Ashton says. “In fact, I think I’m off the job.”

Luke smiles hesitantly. “Really.”

Ashton takes the last small step up to the counter. “Really. So if you’ll let me have a do-over with dinner, free of garlic…?” He holds his hand out to Luke over the counter. Luke raises his eyebrows. “Or we could avoid food completely?”

Luke looks at Ashton’s hand. “You know how long Michael yelled at me for flying home in my state? He said I should have known better than to eat seasoned fries.”

“I’m really glad you’re okay,” Ashton says. Luke smiles and puts his hand in Ashton’s. “No food then. How about a movie?”

The door opens and two people walk in. Luke squeezes Ashton’s hand. “I’ll text you.”

Ashton gets into his car and sends a text to his whole family saying he’s quitting, effective immediately. If one of his relatives gets sent after him, he’ll deal with it then. He refuses to worry about it. He has a second date with Luke to think about.

Luke and Ashton see a different movie almost every night that week. Ashton isn’t sure when they decide that they don’t really want to do a movie seven nights in a row, but somehow they end up in Luke’s apartment instead of at the movies, and Ashton isn’t complaining. They start out sitting side by side and trying to decide on what to watch if they’re not going to watch a movie, and they still haven’t settled on anything, Netflix home screen silently playing the same preview on a loop, when Michael gets home earlier than Luke had said he would. Ashton jumps when the door slams shut.

“ _This_ is what you wouldn’t tell me about?” Michael asks.

“You’d tell me I was being an idiot,” Luke says. Ashton wants to be offended, but to be fair, Luke did almost die on their first date.

“I’d be right. I told Calum to stay out of it and he listened, why couldn’t you?”

Luke starts to argue with Michael. Behind him, Calum gives Ashton a small wave and Ashton waves back sheepishly before running a hand through his hair. He’s sure it looks ridiculous from Luke tugging at it for who knows how long.

“So what’s going on here?” Michael asks, and Ashton doesn’t know which of them he’s talking to. He would have no trouble believing Michael was ready to tear him apart in a second if Luke even hinted at anything negative between them.

“What does it look like?” Luke asks.

“No but how? Why?”

“Can I?” Ashton asks, slowly raising his hand. Luke gestures for him to go ahead. “I’m not a hunter anymore. I quit.”

“Why?” Calum asks, and Michael turns to him briefly before looking back at Ashton.

“Because vampires aren’t bad like I was taught they were, or, are. Or, aren’t. I mean, you have reflections, you don’t burn up in the daylight, you don’t kill people, you can fly—”

Michael snorts. “But how come you two are…?” He waves his hands in their direction as a replacement for finishing the sentence with real words.

“Because I was right about Ashton liking me,” Luke says almost smugly.

“You gave up hunting vampires because of him?” Calum asks. Ashton nods and then smiles at Luke.

“You guys are gross,” Michael declares, pulling Calum behind him down the hall.

“You didn’t tell me he didn’t know,” Ashton says after he hears Michael’s door close.

“I didn’t think he’d take it too well.”

“It looked like he did?”

“He trusts me, even if he’s mad about it.” Luke grins and brings his arms back up around the back of Ashton’s neck. “Anyway, I think we were in the middle of something?”

“Yeah, we never picked a movie,” Ashton says, pretending to reach for the remote they’d long since abandoned.

Luke only tightens his arms around Ashton and pulls him close enough to kiss his cheek. “I can think of something better.”

**The end.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Congratulations! You've reached one of the ending-endings!


End file.
